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Taking a quick break to scope out the smooth rock descent

Khoa, Steve, Tim & I got out to El Moro near Newport Coast for a loop. The beauty of El Moro is that it is right next to the beach which makes El Moro a great place to ride when it is hot out. Although there is not much tree coverage, being closer to the ocean reduces the temperature and boy was it hot in Southern California with temperatures reaching triple digits farther inland where I live.

Tim taking it with ease

El Moro started with some fun singletrack which led to a short fireroad descent that led to the most overgrown singletrack I’ve ridden through to date. The weeds were taller than me and the other plants we rode through left scratches on my arm including one that was deep enough to bleed. One section required a continual “ducking�? while pedaling manuever to avoid getting my faced whipped by the weeds. Khoa made the comment that sometimes being short has its advantages. At that moment, I couldn’t agree more. By the way I performed a quick tick check afterwards. Highly recommended when riding through areas with bushes and other vegetation inundating the trail.

Some of the best parts of this ride didn’t even involve riding. It involved being at the top of a climb and looking back on the beautiful Pacific Ocean. Khoa’s camera phone pictures, thanks Khoa, do not do justice to the magnificent ocean. Yes, that’s the Pacific behind us and no, it did not just turn turquoise. haha. We took a detour just to get a better look at it (well worth the detour, I might add).

Turquoise Pacific Ocean

The ride ended on a slightly sour note as I grazed a cactus leaf on the way back to the car. It left a few thorns in my shin and flatted my rear tire out about 200 yards from the car. I was too lazy to change it so I just hoofed it out. No worries though the bike is ok.

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As RL mentioned in a previous post, 7 of us made it out to San Juan to ride the bottom half of San Juan Trail. This trail is my cup of tea. The climbing was not fun but it paid off with a nice singletrack descent that had some technical elements in it including lots of exposure, switchbacks and baby-head sized rocks. As RL mentioned he, Priscilla and Joe decided to turn back because of knee issues, too much exposure and being a great guy, respectively.

Wayland, the 2 Davids and I continued up to Cocktail Rock and after a short respite that included meeting a pair of Sam’s and another dude named Weyland (really small world), the four of us headed back down. 3 of us were on fully rigids while one of the David’s was on a gorgeous deep blue Titus Riddler hardtail.

The foggy weather kept things cool for the 4 of us

Very interestingly enough going down was just as difficult as going up but for different reasons. Climbing was difficult (for me) because of my lack of endurance. I love my local loop, but what it misses is one significantly long/leggy climb, a gasser as I like to think of them. San Juan is an out and back 6 mile up/6 mile down trail.

Elevation map via geoladders.com

Thankfully the first 1.5 – 2 miles were the steepest with more than 10+ switchbacks. After that the switchbacks become sparser and the trail mellows out to a more conquerable 4-6% grade. But, what this 2nd part of climbing lacks in steepness and switchbacks, it more than makes up for it with rocks, ruts and exposure… lots of exposure. Get off your bike and walk across life threatening exposure.

Playing around at Cocktail Rock

Interestingly enough the switchbacks that I had a tough time with ascending were equally if not even more difficult descending. I did discover that I am much better at left turn switchbacks as compared to right turn switchbacks. What surprised me was that for parts of the trail that had “walk across life threatening exposure�? on the way up, I mostly just rode through on the way down.

Navigating the singletrack

All of us made it down in one piece (with a few stretch/pee breaks) and of course I had a ticket to greet me. Bummer as I did not see the Adventure Pass signs.

Donning the armor for the ride back down

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