The forecast could not have been better when a small group of us hit the trail at a little after 7:30: perfectly clear skies, temps in the high 70s, and over 36 miles and 5500 feet of climbing ahead of us. The ride began with a brisk climb up East Mesa Fire Road, but soon leveled out and narrowed to to a small ribbon of singletrack cutting through the grasslands of Cuyamaca Ranchero State Park.
It didn’t take long for the work to begin as we hit the Indian Creek single track:
Indian Creek would be steep enough even if it were buff as a baby’s bottom, but it’s the loose rocks that really give your heart a good workout:
Who put those there?
You can get a sense of the rapid ascent from this pic:
The climbing isn’t for nothing though, as you are rewarded with some nice views:
(That’s Anza-Borrego desert back there).
After some fantastic stretches of singletrack and a little paved road, we refilled our water tanks at Penny Pines and hit the Noble Canyon trailhead:
If sections of Hurkey Creek were made when God came down out of the clouds and laid down a ribbon of singletrack, sections of this trail must have been excreted out of one of the Devil’s orifices. With sections named “widow maker,” “stairway to hell,” and “whore” this isn’t usually the kind of stuff this buff single track lovin’ boy would be riding. But the really chunky sections can easily be walked by wimps like me, and the rest of the trail is just an all-out blast to ride.
The trail starts out smooth and fast. There were even a couple of guys riding it on unicycles!
But if riding chunk is your thing, Noble does not disappoint:
That’s Barcy givin’ the stairway to hell some hell.
Sometimes I feel like a wuss for walking the chunkier sections, but riding chunk does come with a few risks. At one point, Rob was balanced in a trackstand over a challenging uphill section. When he stuck out his left foot to catch himself, there was no ground there to catch him since the trail is exposed and he fell down the cliff about 15 feet, ass over teakettle, onto some rocks. Amazingly, he only had a minor scrape and a jammed finger. I think he lost one of his nine lives though! Here’s the crew helping to get his bike back to the trail:
Unfortunately, what goes down then needs to climb back up. After finishing Noble, we needed to climb the dreaded Pine Creek Road, which is 6 miles of 10-20% grades. I was actually not feeling too bad on this climb today, but before I pat myself on the back, consider that Barcy, pictured in the distance here, is climbing the entire thing on a single speed! He made good use of the traverse climbing technique.
It helps when in pain to contemplate the little details:
All in all, it took over 7 hrs to do the whole loop, though we had plenty of stop time and we were definitely in no hurry. Thankfully, Phil had the foresight to have some beer waiting in a cooler when we got back to the cars. It’s a terrific recovery beverage, which I drink solely to replenish depleted glycogen sores, mind you.
Maps and stats for the day:
