Before I get into the details of this ride I need to talk about mountain biking in the rain in this area because it is easily misunderstood. Nearly all of the local wilderness parks in the area close their trails for a day or two after a rain, and for good reason. They are all areas with mostly clay soil. For most hikers and bikers, using those trails after a rain is either impossible or causes loads of trail damage. The wet clay clings to anything that touches it with amazing tenacity. And that includes the clay itself. There really is nothing similar to it. If you wanted to make some kind of cement or glue with the same properties you would not be able to do any better than nature has already done with southern California clay. As you attempt to walk over a wet clay surface, your first stride acts like some kind of shoe shaped cookie cutter, plucking a 2 – 3 inch thick chunk of clay out of the ground which stays resolutely attached to the bottom of your shoe and weighs in at approximately ten pounds. You hope your next step will shake the mess loose, but instead the clay on your shoe stays firmly in place while it grabs another chunk just like it from the surface of the trail. Within a few steps you look like Gene Simmons and you have no control over what direction you are going because the clay is super slippery. Mountain bikers fare no better. Usually 1-2 wheel revolutions pack mud out to the bike frame making it impossible for the wheels to turn. Cleaning your bike can take forever and the clay takes a toll on your bike’s drivetrain and anything else it can get into, which is everything, basically. But the clay is not always that bad, and not on every trail. So if you can manage to propel your bike over the clay it usually leaves a deep impression in the trail surface. If nothing disturbs it, the trail will harden that way. Not good.

So why did I go riding on wet trails on a rainy day? Do I have a desire to destroy trails? Do I just not care? Of course not. The simple rule is to ride on surfaces that are not clay, and that is what I did on this ride.

Elapsed Time	Moving Time	Distance	Average Speed	Max Speed	Elevation Gain	Calories Burned
04:09:41 hours	03:04:38 hours	26.37 mi.	8.57 mph	32.88 mph	1,896.33 ft.	1,619 kcal

I wanted to come back via the canyon, but the soft trail conditions were sapping my energy. Antonio saved the day.

Surfaces that are good to ride on when wet include decomposed granite, gravel, sand and of course pavement. My route was along Trabuco Canyon, and the canyon is a river bed, naturally rocky and sandy. Some sections of the trail are even raised road beds, so they are even better in the wet. One temptation while riding a wet trail is to stay slightly off the trail in the ground cover. Don’t do it. It widens the trail unnecessarily and increases impact and erosion. It also helps that I was riding my 29 plus bike with floaty 3.0 tires, dropped to 14psi and converted to tubeless.

Decomposed granite: good

Gravel: good

Pavement: duh

I arrived at the trailhead greeted by the last cloudburst of the day. I had been watching the real time weather reports and I timed my ride almost perfectly. Once I was ready to ride I enjoyed a few minutes of Pandora inside my car watching the puddles in the parking lot as the last raindrops hitting them tapered off. El Nino is bringing warm rain showers, so a light jacket was all I needed to stay comfortable.

As I rode, the skies turned from this…

Into this

I started with a big pavement climb to get me to the decomposed granite trails of Ladera Ranch.

I was skeptical

I encountered this silly cone on the sidewalk section of the climb. Gardeners were trimming trees and there were a lot of cuttings all over the sidewalk. But seriously, close the sidewalk for some sticks? Weren’t they being a little overly cautious? Further down the trail I saw why they had closed it.

Ok, sidewalk closed, I get it

This bad boy was straddling the sidewalk. So I guess the sidewalk really was closed. I went around, no problem. But if you had a stroller you would have to turn back.

Bigger than usual

Trabuco Creek was running deep, as expected. You have to be careful in conditions like these. Often the stream keeps rising long after the rain stops. But that was not the case today. I was able to ride about half the crossings. I walked the remainder, using my bike as support.

A mud fender. And bottom bracket. And pedals.

I have ridden my Fatback with full 4.7″ fat tires on this same trail, and they did work. But I like 29 plus better. It was actually a lot of fun negotiating deep gravel, loose sand and wet conditions. It is where the big hula hoops show off their biggest advantage over smaller tires.

Fickle Tijeras Creek

The new section of the ride for me was the upper section of Tijeras Creek Trail. I made a couple of wrong turns but negotiated it without much incident.

Please stay on trail

I will be staying on this side of the trail, thank you

I had planned a much bigger ride, but before I reached Santa Margarita Parkway, all of the soft trail surfaces, stream crossings, getting on and off the bike, etc. had taken its toll. I still pulled off a big ride as you can see from the Strava numbers. But is was time to execute my exit strategy. Rather than returning via the canyon, I returned along Antonio Parkway, which was a fast easy descent. It means I did my climbing on the more technical terrain and descended on easy terrain, which is the opposite of what I like to do. But a bail out is a bail out, and the ride was still good. I did not even feel like I had been a big baby when I stopped for my last bit of trail food.

It is OK to baby yourself a little when riding tough conditions

I am still focusing my riding on Trabuco Canyon loops. If the trails dry out fast enough I will be back in a couple of days to see if I can do the big loop I had planned for this day.

Here it is late February and I have a few days of downtime as I change jobs. So what should I do? Go riding, of course!

Elapsed Time	Moving Time	Distance	Average Speed	Max Speed	Elevation Gain	Calories Burned
04:32:05 hours	02:55:58 hours	24.12 mi.	8.22 mph	35.12 mph	2,079.40 ft.	1,471 kcal

President’s Day was unusually warm. We were supposed to be getting slammed by El Nino driven rain storms by now, but they have not materialized yet. El Nino has until April to deliver its rain to southern California, we can only wait and see. For this ride skies were blue and temps rose into the 90’s. The rain we have been getting has been sufficient to transform much of our brown natural landscape green, which is a welcome change. So it was strange to see tumbleweeds at several locations on the trail. No doubt they were loosened up and collected into clumps by our recent Santa Ana winds.

Excuse me guys

Tumbleweeds turned this short section of fire road into singletrack

You never know what you will find along the trail as you ride in and out of civilized areas. Like this impromptu rest area complete with folding chair and umbrella, near nothing in particular. A glass of wine and a good book maybe?

Whatever works for you

Farther along I have discovered a way to cross San Juan Creek at La Novia that does not involve the narrow bridge. There is a creek crossing very close to the bridge. The creek is dry and the creek bed is typical deep loose sand. But the 29 plus tires have no problem handling the loose stuff. And the crossing features a strange old piece of hardware I cannot identify. Maybe it was a pump of some sort, or part of a bridge that used to be here.

Hmmm, lets have a closer look

Something has seen better days

I remain excited about the extension of the paved bike trail around the Ortega choke point. Since I rode it last time, San Juan Capistrano has painted lines and the construction equipment is gone.

It looks more official now with the yellow line

Once nice thing about suburban mountain biking is having access to civilized pit stops.

Lunch break

I stopped at Taco Mesa at a plaza on Crown Valley Parkway. I had a single fish taco a la carte. That is all I can handle eating in the middle of a big ride. If I eat more than that my energy level and stomach do not cooperate later on. Taco Mesa has a well earned good reputation, I give them a thumbs up. The large soda was almost five bucks though, so look out for that. Ice water is better for you anyway. After a brief lunch I stopped at the Circle K in the same plaza to top off the Gatorade in my Camelbak and I was on my way again. Try that when you are climbing Santiago Truck Trail!

The trail crosses the stream here

I went inland along the canyon as far as Oso Parkway, crossing the bridge there and returning along the other (west) side of the canyon. All of the bridges over Arroyo Trabuco afford a nice view of the canyon below. The trails along the other side are not as well traveled, and it was the first time I rode this section. I had to navigate some pavement through a neighborhood to access it. I was surprised to look at my Strava results after the ride. The large segment in that area had only been ridden by 11 riders, so I was able to claim 6th overall, even though I was riding in “exploration” mode. It featured some nice singletrack.

Don’t do it!

Also while on the bridge I spotted this lone rider in the distance trying to figure out if they should cross this sketchy section of trail. He took too long to decide so I continued my ride without knowing what he decided to do.

A crossroads

Later in the ride I stopped at the park by the bridge over Trabuco Canyon near the confluence of it and San Juan Creek. There is always a lot to see there. That day there was a barbeque, someone playing in the concrete riverbed (not recommended), multiple riders going past, and a great view of crowded 5 freeway nearby. The bridge is signed telling cyclists they must walk over the bridge. I have no idea why. And I have never seen a single cyclist walk their bike over the bridge in the many years I have ridden by it.

Grrr

Near the end of the ride my chain broke. For the third time. So it is time for a new one. This time I caught it before it broke since it was skipping around the cassette. I had to actually break it myself, which always seems weird. Making the best of the situation, I made the busted link pose for an arsty pic.

I am back to ridewithgps.com to plan more changes to this loop. I don’t know when, if ever, I will tire of exploring all of the riding options available along this route.

If you have followed my ride reports you may have noticed that I have done a similar loop lately, changing the route a little every time. Today’s change was that I did the loop in reverse, eliminated some climbs and did more mileage instead.

Elapsed Time	Moving Time	Distance	Average Speed	Max Speed	Elevation Gain	Calories Burned
03:48:28 hours	03:02:51 hours	27.02 mi.	8.87 mph	30.20 mph	1,649.61 ft.	1,571 kcal

The first thing I met of any significance was of GREAT significance. San Juan Capistrano has extended the bike trail from Reata Park all the way to Calle Arroyo, which means cyclists do not have to brave the “Ortega choke point” anymore.

A trail to allow cyclists to avoid the Ortega choke point

Ahh, the smell of a new trail

Down Crown Valley

Kinda artsy

The Crown Valley bridge over Arroyo Trabuco actually has some nice architecture to it and affords a good view of the valley it crosses as long as you are on a bike or on foot and able to see it. The view from the cars is not so interesting.

Do you people know what an interesting bridge you are on?

‘splain dis to me homey

Since I had two contradictory signs to chose from, I chose the park sign and proceeded. I have passed by this many times in the other direction and never looked back and saw the gate. When you enter the trails in the other direction there are no “No Trespassing” signs posted.

One of these days I want to visit that winery.

The winery is at one end of my short trek down Camino Capistrano. I stopped for a break in the open space area.

Meta photography

Due to sufficient rain this year the local vegetation is turning green. It is a nice change.

I likey

I got a cheap grip/bar end combo from a Chinese seller on Amazon. The bar ends had a small burr under the finish and the left grip rotates slightly even when tightened properly. In practice I did not notice either problem while riding, and I do like the bar ends. I was in them most of the ride. The red Togs (thumb over grip system) works well. Between the two of them I have multiple additional hand positions on a simple flat bar. FYI, the Truvativ T40 Noir carbon flat bar comes with plugs that are aluminum inserts to support lock on grips and bar ends.

The gates of…Saddleback Church

The other end of my ride down Camino Capistrano was Saddleback Church. The campus is really beautiful featuring a pond, a chapel and buildings that look like they were inspired by the missions. I will have to take pics of them on a future ride.

Once past the church you enter the San Juan Creek area.

This place was green before green was cool

The area is full of remnants of an Orange grove and who knows what else. I mean someone probably does know, just not me. Like this thing, a large concrete bowl that won’t be hanging on much longer.

I hope this is not important to anyone

Or a semi trailer that probably can only be removed by a helicopter lift.

Free to a good home

Or this poor nursery which I have taken pics of before.

Guilty of releasing greenhouse gasses

And the occasional unexpected amazing view. Well, it would be unexpected if you had not seen it in a blog already.

A wild canyon hiding in plain sight in suburbia

This area is not popular among mountain bikers. It is mostly fire road, not singletrack, so mountain bikers find it boring. I have seen very few mountain bikers back here. But I have seen many more equestrians. Like the two I encountered on this ride. Sorry, I did not get pictures but I wanted to describe what happened with them. I have had many riders on horses tell me that there is no need to stop for horses in an area like this. Riders should not be riding horses on multi use trails that get spooked by bikes. But I am still accommodating of riders. I slow down, make eye contact and try to get some kind of gesture that it is OK. Then I ride by, slowing down if I need to. When you ride as slow as I do, slowing down is not always necessary. On this ride I encountered a horse that got spooked by me from a long way off. I stopped and waited for the rider to go by. He brought the horse a little closer to me as he rode by, I presume to get the horse comfortable with bikes. The rider even explained in passing that the horse never got spooked by bikes. I have to presume it was my 29 plus tires. They have the same effect on roadies.

That raised my sensitivity to horses. Just minutes afterward  I was riding a long shallow descent and flying along the trail nicely. A tree blocked my view past a sharp turn, but looking through the tree I was able to see another horse rider coming up the trail. I slowed down and the rider pulled the horse to the side of the trail. This rider had nothing to say, but I always complement the horse as I ride by,”beautiful horse!” Riders seem to universally appreciate it. And I mean it, too. It is sort of like saying “Nice hawg” to a Harley rider. It is a good way to break the ice and maintain good relations with other trail users.

The trail continued down to the beach. The tide was very low at the time. My 29 plus bike is actually a fat bike with 29 plus wheels and tires, so I am familiar with riding beach sand. I broke off the trail and hit the sand. The plus tires were fine in sand like this. They tended to sink in a little more than the my 4.7″ Big Fat Larrys of course, so they were a little more effort in the sand, but manageable.

My Fatback, at home on beach sand, even with puny little 29 plus 3.0 tires

A low tide usually means a high tide, and a recent high tide took out part of the parking lot at the beach.

No parking. Seriously. No. Parking.

Farther down the beach there was a strange visitor.

Nice doggy?

A little bit of a disappointment

I left the beach via a railroad underpass.

Bye bye puppy. Kinda. Whatever.

Under construction

The final leg of the ride took me under the 5 freeway which is being widened. While under construction it looks like the entire thing is being held up by exclusively by wooden supports. It was a fitting end to ride the featured new trails, a new direction and new ends.

I continued the evolution of my local suburban wilderness loop today. I cannot recommend this version, however, due to numerous steep climbs. Next week I plan a variant of the reverse of this loop with a few mods, look for a ride report on that in the near future.

Elapsed Time	Moving Time	Distance	Average Speed	Max Speed	Elevation Gain	Calories Burned
03:10:12 hours	02:14:28 hours	15.78 mi.	7.04 mph	28.86 mph	2,173.88 ft.	1,009 kcal

The theme for this ride is “signs”. Partway through the ride I realized how many signs I had encountered on this route. I found them to be pretty interesting once I started to pay attention to them. After a while a pattern and collective message began to appear. The route I took was through a series of interconnecting wilderness area that are being preserved as best as possible as development, civilization, sprawl, whatever you want to call it, grows around them. One important tool that land managers employ in their attempts to protect wilderness is the classic sign. Most of them are friendly and educational, but not always. They even be kind of funny sometimes.

Kudos to Bill!

I cannot tell you how much I love this sign. Bill wins my sign of the day award, he is a doer. He went through the right channels to do this, paid for these, installed them and maintains them himself. He also put his full name, email address and phone number on the sign in an effort to develop some community support for his efforts.

Yes, that is litter

This is the same can. It looks like not everyone can read, see, care, or whatever. For the record, I tossed the paper in the can after taking the pic.

Please stay to the right

I have never been able to figure out what this concrete basin thingy used to be. It looks like it was maybe meant to hold water?

A high spot

This is a good view of some of the area my ride took me through. Even though it is mostly developed there is a network of preserves running through it that make fun and interesting places to go mountain biking.

Hiding in plain sight

I first encountered this tent weeks ago when I started riding variations of this loop. The first time I went by I presumed it was a “stealth camp” of someone riding or hiking through. It would be a good spot for that. Stealth campers usually stay one night and leave at first light to avoid detection. This is a permanent residence. You can see a clothing scarecrow on the right, it is always there.

Civilization drop

I must admit to enjoying showing off on this section of the ride. It drops into a (usually) busy intersection by way of a pretty steep descent so I put on a show for all the motorists stuck at the traffic light. I then make my way into the left turn lane and proceed under the freeway you see in the picture, where there is no bike lane so I pretty much claim the entire right lane. Once drivers see me drop in like that they tend to leave me a little extra room.

San Juan Creek movement

If you examine the lower left corner of the above pic you will see that the left side of the trail is gone. It dropped down a small cliff into the creek below, taking the wooden rails with it. That section of the trail is now closed, and the new upper tier is the route that I took.

A bridge to somewhere

This is a dedicated bike/pedestrian bridge that is part of the San Juan Capistrano bike lane system, as seen from a dedicated bike underpass that takes you under Rancho Viejo Road.

Still some rural left

The climb up from Rancho VIejo road affords views of the creek below, which is running in this wet season, right by this last outpost of rural residents.

A study in contrasts

More kudos to attempts to preserve some wilderness, even when they offer a great view of the 5 freeway and the “Shops at Mission Viejo” mall in the distance.

Welcome coverage in a treeless landscape

The hills here are treeless grasslands, probably because they used to be ranches. Cattle trails weave up the hillsides everywhere. This little shelter is a welcome rest stop. The irony of barbed wire and wilderness together is not lost on me.

I know it well

I did not know the Ortega choke point had an official name. I know it well. It is a very short section of Ortega highway that goes from 5 lanes to 2 then back to 5 around a blind curve. The bike lanes end because there is no room and shrubs and trees grow over the side of the road, making it extremely dangerous for bikes. I have looked into why it exists a few times and found no good explanation. It looks like there may be more information about it now, but I have not looked at it yet.

My pet peeve

Rant alert! I really wish we would stop calling this kind of trail a “bike trail”. If pedestrians have the right of way they are multi use trails at best, and glorified sidewalks at worst. I generally avoid them when riding my bike because mixing bikes and pedestrians on a trial like this is very dangerous in my experience. Most pedestrians cannot agree what side of the path to walk on, or walk all over the trail as if there were no lanes, all while being oblivious to cyclists. Some treat it like the road, where they should be on the left side. When “bike lanes” post rules, however, they all state pedestrians should be on the right. When I ride up behind a group of pedestrians they often scatter onto both sides of the trail, sometimes running back and forth as they try to figure out what to do, and some just freeze in the middle of the trail. What I would love to see is a bicycle only trail where pedestrians were not allowed. I don’t think anything like that exists in the US, and even if it did it would get ignored and used by pedestrians anyway. Bike lanes on the street work much better as long as they are wide enough. This is a very short trail for now and I have never seen another bike or pedestrian on it. It does help you get around the Ortega choke point, so it has that going for it.

New food

I decided to try baby food as ride food. It is available in friendly packaging, is easy to digest, is affordable, and tastes like food. Not all of these packets are called baby food. Power Bars are still great, the reason there is not one in this picture is that I had already eaten the one I packed. I have an assortment to try and this is the first one I used. It worked great, no problems yet, I foresee these becoming ride staples.

Alrighty then

This sign along the San Juan Creek is interesting. The creek is impassible in most places and those dangers are pretty much everywhere in local wildernesses, but telling people again can’t hurt I guess.

I must be missing something

Seriously, that is all there is to the pond. It is above creek level. When it gets full it would basically be a puddle. What could it do, jump out at you?

No, really, keep out

This trail crosses San Juan Creek, which was dry. It is only a few hundred feet long and there are several of these signs on both sides of the trail. I think you are supposed to stay on the trail, not real sure though. In fairness to those who posted the signs, the area is dangerous, the land is a mix of private and public, and the trail leads to horse stables so there are many kinds of trail users.

It’s private

This tiny little “park” is little more than a grassy corner of an intersection with a separate sidewalk running through it. The sign informs you that it is a private park. But wait, there’s more…

Upon further inspection

This is the same “park”, with lots of rules and further clarification of its private status.

For those of you who have not seen those little posts sticking out of the top of the sign, they are there to keep birds from lighting on the sign and contributing their droppings to the dog dropping clean up station. More irony, no?

Signs are one way that urban riding differs from wilderness riding. If you pay attention you can learn a lot about your surroundings as you ride.