As I told Dirt Bike Dave, God must love dirtbikes.
I met Dave at the CC turnoff at 8:15 am. We quickly drove to Oak Flat cg and suited up. It was somewhere in the low 30's temperature wise. I layered up as usual, as did Dave. I could see some snow on the peaks as we drove in, but couldn't tell how much. We headed north out of camp and began our fun. Anything that wasn't in direct sunlight was frozen solid, all day long. We shot down a fun downhill trail that emptied out into a small valley where mining used to be done. On our way back out, we had serious traction issues in one shady/icy section. We fought our way through and now headed east. We found a trail I was very familiar with and followed it for several fun miles. As we climbed, I stopped at a clearing and informed Dave that we would soon be blasting through some snow. Serious snow. We found a trail that was untouched, but far from innocent! I pointed to Dave for a hard left hand turn up a steep slope of 50/50 snow and mud. I couldn't look back and chance losing momentum, so I blazed through several inches of virgin snow, at times literally searching for the trail with my front wheel. I stopped at another clearing and listened for Dave. Sure enough, he was close behind. I knew it was Dave, because we had the whole area to ourselves. After debating on weather to do the same trail again, I decided that there was plenty more to see to the southeast. We stayed on single track untill dumping out on the Idria side onto road 1. Just past the reservoir, we went hard left and off into more snow. We snaked through manzanita tunnels and flume like trails for miles. We stopped for a short break and switched bikes. I found one of my favorite trails and jammed down a razorback ridge into some more supreme single track. I played slip and slide on an icy uphill and was rudely spit off of Daves CRE250. We attempted to make it up the slope to no avail. After a short double back, we continued on. Snow was heavy, so I headed for lower elevation. We headed down on fire road trying to keep our rear wheels from passing our front wheels. I've never had more fun on fire road. We merged with the paved KCAC road and dual sported for a couple miles. Near the 'playground' we crossed the creek and busted through more virgin trail on our way to the plane crash site. Conditions were perfect here. We wound our way around and ended up at Spanish Lake. We found mud that felt like lithium grease and then would be frozen solid around the next bend. We would stop many times on the way back to camp to admire the great views. We could clearly see the snow capped Sierra Nevada range to the east and the Los Padres range to the west. Awesome! We cracked the frozen lids off hundreds of puddles on the way to camp. We struggled for traction in some areas and roosted hard in others. I hit reserve with about 5 miles to go. Yeah, we were loving it. After getting back to our trucks, we had lunch and talked about our ride. After a short cool down ride, we loaded up and promised to do it again as we enjoyed some of the best cookies ever made courtesy of Daves wife.
To all those planning a trip, bring lots of warm clothing and fire wood. I'll see some of you there someday.
I met Dave at the CC turnoff at 8:15 am. We quickly drove to Oak Flat cg and suited up. It was somewhere in the low 30's temperature wise. I layered up as usual, as did Dave. I could see some snow on the peaks as we drove in, but couldn't tell how much. We headed north out of camp and began our fun. Anything that wasn't in direct sunlight was frozen solid, all day long. We shot down a fun downhill trail that emptied out into a small valley where mining used to be done. On our way back out, we had serious traction issues in one shady/icy section. We fought our way through and now headed east. We found a trail I was very familiar with and followed it for several fun miles. As we climbed, I stopped at a clearing and informed Dave that we would soon be blasting through some snow. Serious snow. We found a trail that was untouched, but far from innocent! I pointed to Dave for a hard left hand turn up a steep slope of 50/50 snow and mud. I couldn't look back and chance losing momentum, so I blazed through several inches of virgin snow, at times literally searching for the trail with my front wheel. I stopped at another clearing and listened for Dave. Sure enough, he was close behind. I knew it was Dave, because we had the whole area to ourselves. After debating on weather to do the same trail again, I decided that there was plenty more to see to the southeast. We stayed on single track untill dumping out on the Idria side onto road 1. Just past the reservoir, we went hard left and off into more snow. We snaked through manzanita tunnels and flume like trails for miles. We stopped for a short break and switched bikes. I found one of my favorite trails and jammed down a razorback ridge into some more supreme single track. I played slip and slide on an icy uphill and was rudely spit off of Daves CRE250. We attempted to make it up the slope to no avail. After a short double back, we continued on. Snow was heavy, so I headed for lower elevation. We headed down on fire road trying to keep our rear wheels from passing our front wheels. I've never had more fun on fire road. We merged with the paved KCAC road and dual sported for a couple miles. Near the 'playground' we crossed the creek and busted through more virgin trail on our way to the plane crash site. Conditions were perfect here. We wound our way around and ended up at Spanish Lake. We found mud that felt like lithium grease and then would be frozen solid around the next bend. We would stop many times on the way back to camp to admire the great views. We could clearly see the snow capped Sierra Nevada range to the east and the Los Padres range to the west. Awesome! We cracked the frozen lids off hundreds of puddles on the way to camp. We struggled for traction in some areas and roosted hard in others. I hit reserve with about 5 miles to go. Yeah, we were loving it. After getting back to our trucks, we had lunch and talked about our ride. After a short cool down ride, we loaded up and promised to do it again as we enjoyed some of the best cookies ever made courtesy of Daves wife.
To all those planning a trip, bring lots of warm clothing and fire wood. I'll see some of you there someday.
