Across the Caliente Mountains
Posted: Tue Apr 09, 2019 10:01 pm
My last trip to the Carrizo Plain left an unanswered question: how do you cross over the Caliente Mountains to the Cuyama River? The signage at the bottom of the road to the ridge and on top of the ridge says there's no access to highway 166 below, in the Cuyama valley:
Looking at a map, it looks like there're farms and oil fields below, and I guess there are access issues. Then I came across the Tour de Los Padres, a bike packing route that includes a crossing of the Caliente Mountains that I was thinking about. The route looked hairy, but there would be flowers. So on Friday night Kris, Chen and I camped out near the Southern end of the Carrizo plain. The plan was to spend Saturday and Sunday riding the section of the Tour de Los Padres in the Carrizo Plain and in the Caliente Mountains.
We woke up looking at fields of yellows, got our stuff ready, and eventually got going.
We crossed a minor set of hills on a good dirt road, and ended up at the Southern end of Elkhorn Valley. Here were colors.
There were a handful of tourists and a few bike people, but it was pretty empty. We rode North on Elkhorn road, which is in great shape:
As we got closer to Soda Lake, there were more and more people. Until it was quite a zoo. We turned left on Simmler road (again, a dirt road in great shape). Our plan of getting water at Selby camp didn't work: there was no water there. But we randomly ran into some friends, and took their water instead. Recharged, we climbed up to Caliente ridge. Good dirt road. Steep. Climbs 2000ft in 3 miles. There were lots of people here too. We rode only 50 miles at this point, so this was a decision point: keep riding, or camp early? There were only 20 miles left until the highway (hah!), and the ridge top was a nice place to camp:
So we set up camp early. The next morning we passed some "no access to hwy 166" signs, and set out on the exciting part of the route. The next humans we saw after this point were down in the valley. Initially we descended on a good dirt road until it abruptly ended at a fence. Except the road didn't really end, but got much much more faint. Here's the "road" traversing a ridge:
Chen is on the road:
Then we descended down to what the USGS quads call an oil well (long abandoned)
And popped out on a much better dirt road. Looking back:
At this point the route is on a decent dirt road, and traverses some pretty bucolic scenery.
There are no people here; this thing looks abandoned. After a while we crossed Carrizo Creek. It had a trickle of water, so we filled up. Here the road follows the creek down to hwy 166 (I think; more on this later). We followed the route, however, by going West on the Gillam Spring trail (32S11). This is signed. The "trail" is actually a dirt road along the creek, with an openable gate at the start. Starts like this:
and becomes more rideable quickly. Lots of cows and cow pies here. Also, bucolic.
The road climbs along the creek, and the creek has water. Near Gillam Spring (we had enough water at this point, so didn't go to the spring itself) the route goes left on some poorly-defined trail. We found it eventually
And it becomes a road eventually. This road climbs up to a saddle near one of the upper branches of Sycamore Creek. The road crosses the creek, and begins to climb again, but the route follows the creek down on a rough trail (a cow path, really). This would be fine hiking, but was rough on a not-really-mountain bike and panniers. Those of us who made different choices had no problem. The route descends the creek a bit to a pond
and the traverses a steep slope to a ridge with some powerline towers
This was hard, and took a long time. For some of us. Eventually we dropped down to Gifford Ranch. This is abandoned, but there's a water tank with water coming out of it, which was helpful.
At this point we were almost at the bottom. The map showed a good road to the highway that was really close at this point, and I was excited about the shortcut. But apparently there was some sort of private farm preventing access. So we finished the route: the last few miles before hwy 166 are on a decent single-track, the Gifford Trail.
We had about 40 miles of road left. Compared to the descent to the highway, this was pretty easy, especially since New Cuyama had a restaurant. Riding along the highway, I was looking for signs of public access that could make a shorter route. Between the farms and oil fields I only noticed one place that MAYBE was accessible. I think it was this, and this is close to where Carrizo Creek comes out. So potentially much of the single-track can be bypassed. Then again, that website says that mountain bikes are "not allowed at any time". But we already established that mine isn't a "mountain" bike, so I'm good.
Looking at a map, it looks like there're farms and oil fields below, and I guess there are access issues. Then I came across the Tour de Los Padres, a bike packing route that includes a crossing of the Caliente Mountains that I was thinking about. The route looked hairy, but there would be flowers. So on Friday night Kris, Chen and I camped out near the Southern end of the Carrizo plain. The plan was to spend Saturday and Sunday riding the section of the Tour de Los Padres in the Carrizo Plain and in the Caliente Mountains.
We woke up looking at fields of yellows, got our stuff ready, and eventually got going.
We crossed a minor set of hills on a good dirt road, and ended up at the Southern end of Elkhorn Valley. Here were colors.
There were a handful of tourists and a few bike people, but it was pretty empty. We rode North on Elkhorn road, which is in great shape:
As we got closer to Soda Lake, there were more and more people. Until it was quite a zoo. We turned left on Simmler road (again, a dirt road in great shape). Our plan of getting water at Selby camp didn't work: there was no water there. But we randomly ran into some friends, and took their water instead. Recharged, we climbed up to Caliente ridge. Good dirt road. Steep. Climbs 2000ft in 3 miles. There were lots of people here too. We rode only 50 miles at this point, so this was a decision point: keep riding, or camp early? There were only 20 miles left until the highway (hah!), and the ridge top was a nice place to camp:
So we set up camp early. The next morning we passed some "no access to hwy 166" signs, and set out on the exciting part of the route. The next humans we saw after this point were down in the valley. Initially we descended on a good dirt road until it abruptly ended at a fence. Except the road didn't really end, but got much much more faint. Here's the "road" traversing a ridge:
Chen is on the road:
Then we descended down to what the USGS quads call an oil well (long abandoned)
And popped out on a much better dirt road. Looking back:
At this point the route is on a decent dirt road, and traverses some pretty bucolic scenery.
There are no people here; this thing looks abandoned. After a while we crossed Carrizo Creek. It had a trickle of water, so we filled up. Here the road follows the creek down to hwy 166 (I think; more on this later). We followed the route, however, by going West on the Gillam Spring trail (32S11). This is signed. The "trail" is actually a dirt road along the creek, with an openable gate at the start. Starts like this:
and becomes more rideable quickly. Lots of cows and cow pies here. Also, bucolic.
The road climbs along the creek, and the creek has water. Near Gillam Spring (we had enough water at this point, so didn't go to the spring itself) the route goes left on some poorly-defined trail. We found it eventually
And it becomes a road eventually. This road climbs up to a saddle near one of the upper branches of Sycamore Creek. The road crosses the creek, and begins to climb again, but the route follows the creek down on a rough trail (a cow path, really). This would be fine hiking, but was rough on a not-really-mountain bike and panniers. Those of us who made different choices had no problem. The route descends the creek a bit to a pond
and the traverses a steep slope to a ridge with some powerline towers
This was hard, and took a long time. For some of us. Eventually we dropped down to Gifford Ranch. This is abandoned, but there's a water tank with water coming out of it, which was helpful.
At this point we were almost at the bottom. The map showed a good road to the highway that was really close at this point, and I was excited about the shortcut. But apparently there was some sort of private farm preventing access. So we finished the route: the last few miles before hwy 166 are on a decent single-track, the Gifford Trail.
We had about 40 miles of road left. Compared to the descent to the highway, this was pretty easy, especially since New Cuyama had a restaurant. Riding along the highway, I was looking for signs of public access that could make a shorter route. Between the farms and oil fields I only noticed one place that MAYBE was accessible. I think it was this, and this is close to where Carrizo Creek comes out. So potentially much of the single-track can be bypassed. Then again, that website says that mountain bikes are "not allowed at any time". But we already established that mine isn't a "mountain" bike, so I'm good.