Fall Creek fire road bike ride
Posted: Wed Jul 29, 2020 6:31 pm
Last weekend Kris and I went biking in the mountains. The plan was a chill 2-day ~100-mile loop. Ended up being less chill than expected, but still nice.
We met near the bottom of hwy 2, rode up to Clear Creek, down Angeles Forest hwy a bit, down Big T a bit to the start of the abandoned fire road over there. We then dropped down to Big Tujunga. This section is abandoned, and exists as a rough single-track. Surprising numbers of people even here. One group was canyoneering, with the rest just walking around. We got water at the river.
After a break, we climbed out only to realize that it was now kinda warm, and we didn't have nearly enough water to keep going. So we took a nap under a bush, then went back down to the river, got way more water, and were now good to go. Fall Creek is dry. Fox Creek is still flowing allegedly. The climb up is still a rough single-track, although somebody clipped the bushes, and it's not a bushwhack anymore. After climbing out of the Big Tujunga canyon, this route serves as the service road for Edison's power lines, and it actually receives maintenance and is an actual dirt road. Up until ~ 4000ft this is quite sandy. Above that it firms up, and riding it becomes much easier. At 4000ft the road climbs to a saddle between Fall and Fox creeks, and there's a water tank here which was the camp spot for the night. Only about 37 miles for me this day. Felt like a lot more somehow.
In the morning, I looked at where we were going that day, and we packed up and set off.
I was very excited to find the "Wreck" benchmark. It is gone. But instead we have some sort of measurement of the powerline tower leg strengths
and some sort of loose SCE benchmark instead
I was excited about the next benchmark ("Plane"), but this one had even less to offer. Progress:
Eventually we crested at the Santa Clara Divide road, a bit W of Mt Gleason. The views to the desert opened up here. And looking back were clear views of PV, both sides of Catalina island, and the DTLA towers.
The Station Fire memorial to the firefighters was here. And some ruins. Who has been here? Is this the camp 16 fire-fighting camp? Did it burn down in the Station Fire? Speaking of the Station Fire, there's no tree cover anywhere up to this point. The road here is paved all the way to Mill Creek summit, so this was a quick descent. We got more water, and rode up towards Pacifico mtn. This is dirt again. Pretty burnt out and exposed until the Granite/Round Top ridge, where some trees appear. At the turnoff to the peak we saw this:
From what I hear, 3.2 miles later is right before the paved road junction at Alder Gulch. And that there's nothing obviously wrong with the road. This was a Sunday; there was a dozer parked on the side of the road, doing nothing. Now there were trees and we were relatively high up, so the heat wasn't as oppressive. We took the pavement East towards Islip Saddle. I stared at a suspicious-looking branch at the first tunnel for a solid minute:
Dead-center of the photo. This branch just would not move, so we moved on. Allegedly a friend of a friend of a friend was ticketed riding the closed section of hwy 39, so we played it safe, and went back via Windy gap. Only 75 miles this day. Still felt tired, but this was better than the 37 of the day before.
We met near the bottom of hwy 2, rode up to Clear Creek, down Angeles Forest hwy a bit, down Big T a bit to the start of the abandoned fire road over there. We then dropped down to Big Tujunga. This section is abandoned, and exists as a rough single-track. Surprising numbers of people even here. One group was canyoneering, with the rest just walking around. We got water at the river.
After a break, we climbed out only to realize that it was now kinda warm, and we didn't have nearly enough water to keep going. So we took a nap under a bush, then went back down to the river, got way more water, and were now good to go. Fall Creek is dry. Fox Creek is still flowing allegedly. The climb up is still a rough single-track, although somebody clipped the bushes, and it's not a bushwhack anymore. After climbing out of the Big Tujunga canyon, this route serves as the service road for Edison's power lines, and it actually receives maintenance and is an actual dirt road. Up until ~ 4000ft this is quite sandy. Above that it firms up, and riding it becomes much easier. At 4000ft the road climbs to a saddle between Fall and Fox creeks, and there's a water tank here which was the camp spot for the night. Only about 37 miles for me this day. Felt like a lot more somehow.
In the morning, I looked at where we were going that day, and we packed up and set off.
I was very excited to find the "Wreck" benchmark. It is gone. But instead we have some sort of measurement of the powerline tower leg strengths
and some sort of loose SCE benchmark instead
I was excited about the next benchmark ("Plane"), but this one had even less to offer. Progress:
Eventually we crested at the Santa Clara Divide road, a bit W of Mt Gleason. The views to the desert opened up here. And looking back were clear views of PV, both sides of Catalina island, and the DTLA towers.
The Station Fire memorial to the firefighters was here. And some ruins. Who has been here? Is this the camp 16 fire-fighting camp? Did it burn down in the Station Fire? Speaking of the Station Fire, there's no tree cover anywhere up to this point. The road here is paved all the way to Mill Creek summit, so this was a quick descent. We got more water, and rode up towards Pacifico mtn. This is dirt again. Pretty burnt out and exposed until the Granite/Round Top ridge, where some trees appear. At the turnoff to the peak we saw this:
From what I hear, 3.2 miles later is right before the paved road junction at Alder Gulch. And that there's nothing obviously wrong with the road. This was a Sunday; there was a dozer parked on the side of the road, doing nothing. Now there were trees and we were relatively high up, so the heat wasn't as oppressive. We took the pavement East towards Islip Saddle. I stared at a suspicious-looking branch at the first tunnel for a solid minute:
Dead-center of the photo. This branch just would not move, so we moved on. Allegedly a friend of a friend of a friend was ticketed riding the closed section of hwy 39, so we played it safe, and went back via Windy gap. Only 75 miles this day. Still felt tired, but this was better than the 37 of the day before.
