I'm leading a Wind Dancers ride on April 16. I hate leading rides. In my mind, rides that I lead will end up with me guiding a gaggle of lost riders around in circles while I screw up directions and execute terrible U-turns in front of my peers. Riders behind me fly off of cliffs (unbeknownst to me, of course), get hopelessly far behind or, worse, tailgate me the entire way because, in my imagination, I am the world's slowest human. Once actually out on the road, I spend the entire trip mentally racing for both the Paxil bottle and a stiff drink, preferably both at once.
But I try to be A Productive Member of Our Club and, thus, I ended up signing up to lead this ride.
The route itself was no problem; I knew I wanted to do the southern Santa Cruz Mountains ride that I've done a couple of times lately. It's a great ride. The beginning is challenging but still fun; the ending is technically simpler with nice scenery. Perfect for a group ride, if it weren't for the fact that I had to lead it.
Obviously, I needed a guinea pig. I needed someone to ride behind me on my route, someone who didn't know the roads and who, therefore, needed me to lead. Someone for whom I could make a bag lunch and lead into the great unknown and who would still mostly like me afterwards.
The curtains opened, pouring light into the bedroom.
"Hey!" Peter rolled over and pulled the covers up over his head. "Go 'way."
"Get up," I said. "We're going riding."
The ride officially starts at the Summit Store, up at the summit (go figure) of that section of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Originally a stagecoach stop in the 1800s and rebuilt completely after the Loma Prieta Earthquake of 1986, the store is a full-service grocery for residents and weekend campers, hikers, bicyclists, and now, motorcyclists.
Our stop at the Summit Store was brief due to a blaring car alarm in the parking lot. We rode away from the honking store and south down Summit Road, which quickly turns into Highland Way. After a few miles, the road condition turns a bit to shit. It still doesn't rank on Carolyn's Top Roads of Questionable Condition, though it might after another winter or so, but it was bumpy enough to remind me that hey, wasn't I going to look into replacing my shock? Yes, ow, I think I was. As Highland Way became Eureka Canyon, I started to hear Peter's vertebrae in my ear. "Remember us?" they taunted. "We were broken, remember? And now you took us on this road? Oh, you'll be hearing about this one for a while, yes you will." With all of the potholes pockmarking the road, it's hard to believe that most of Eureka Canyon was rebuilt after a February 1998 landslide covered the road, trapping 500 locals. Makes you wonder what the road condition was like before.
View from the hills, taken September 2004
Eureka Canyon widens as it enters Corralitos and the road condition improves significantly. I pulled over near the Corralitos Market and Sausage Company to stretch. I steeled myself for a litany of soreness from Peter, resulting in days of make-up backrubs, but other than a little hip tightness, he said he was doing just fine. I began to relax about leading a little bit. Maybe I wasn't really going to kill all of my friends.
Browns Valley Road heads northeast out of Corralitos through farmlands and vineyards. It becomes Hazel Dell Road and immediately turns southeast, forming a little peak on the route map. We passed a few horse and cattle ranches while enjoying the sweepers. I always remember the lefthand turn onto Mt Madonna Road because there's a horse farm right there and, for some reason, the same large carmel-colored horse is always standing right at the corner whenever I ride by. I'll be in trouble if
that horse ever dies or moves 100 yards to the right.
Mt Madonna is a fun road, assuming that you were bored on Browns Valley and Hazel Dell and want to get back to the excitement of Highland and Eureka Canyon. The road goes pretty much straight up, ascending from 300' to 1600' in just under 3 miles (that's an average grade of about 12%). Naturally, it's also narrow and, just as naturally, spattered with oncoming SUVs that don't quite understand the concept of keeping to the side. If there's no lane markings, that means they can take up the whole road, right? At least the scenery is pretty, guaranteeing that, well, if you're going to die on a Ford Explorer grill, you may as well look at towering redwoods while you go.
The summit of Mt Madonna houses a four-way intersection, each direction having a different street name. Going straight ahead will take you to Redwood Retreat Road (my favorite dual-sport ride in the area). Turning left puts you on (another) Summit Road, which still ends up at a private road gate, no matter how many times I forget and ride down the entire 10 miles. Peter and I turned right onto Pole Line Road, the main road through Mt Madonna County Park. The first right brought us into a gravel parking area near some picnic tables and a full restroom (real toilets, even!).
We sat and ate our bag lunches underneath the redwoods and madrone trees. I read aloud from the County Parks of Santa Clara: Mount Madonna park brochure ("Park Charter Funds at Work...Thank You!"), making Peter the unwilling recipient of knowledge about cattle baron Henry Miller's summer retreat.
Lunch break at Mt Madonna County Park
We talked a bit during lunch about ride leading. Peter assured me that I was doing well so far, which, OK, he sort of has to, or I smother him in his sleep. But he sounded convincing and I relaxed a little. I fretted about the road condition on Highland Way; we eventually agreed, however, that it really wasn't that bad and that anyone who wanted to whine about it could lead their own damn ride next time.
Pole Line Road heads south through Mt Madonna County Park. It's really short -- only about 1.5 miles -- but it's a pretty road, passing picnic areas and horse staging areas. The park map shows a decent amount of hiking trails, making me wish once again that hiking and motorcycling (or at least the gear needed for each) were more compatible.
As the park ends, Pole Line Road meets up with Hecker Pass Highway (S.R. 152). It's a fairly boring 5 mile section, but it's fast-paced, which is welcome after spending most of the day waffling between first and second gears. A left turn onto Watsonville Road brought us back to the two-lane road lifestyle.
Thwap! Thwapthwapthwap! Butterflies. Thousands of small orange butterflies, all travelling east to west in a very determined fashion, darted amongst the motorcycles in an occasionally vain attempt to cross Watsonville Road. They looked like swarms of locusts in the air. Normally I don't mind smacking into a few bugs, but there's something disconcerting about taking out butterflies.
Still dodging butterflies, I pulled over into Chitactac-Adams Heritage County Park. It's my favorite little hidden park in the whole area, the sort of thing my dad would have dragged me to as a child. Of course, that's the reason why I hated it then and why I love it now. Peter followed me obligingly through the first part of the interpretive trail ("yes, that's nice, dear, it's a marking on a rock"). When I started to head down to the creek, he got big green puppy dog eyes and said "I think I'd rather go home." So, OK. I'll torture the Wind Dancers with the full interpretive trail experience. We pulled back out into the butterfly stream.
"Next time I'll make her go alone"
I like the rocks at Chitactac-Adams.
The rest of the ride is straight-forward and technically uninteresting. It follows Watsonville Road to Uvas Road, past the Uvas Reservoir (which provides neat scenery to look at while dodging SUVs heading towards the boat docks). Uvas becomes McKean Road; another name, another reservoir.
A photo of the SVS at Uvas Reservoir from Sept 2004
I'm technically ending the Wind Dancers ride at Calero Reservoir. It's close to both Hicks Road -- a great twisty little section for those wanting to do more riding -- and to the highway, for those wishing to head home.
Yesterday, Peter and I chose Hicks, which was fun but mentally wiped us both out. It's a steep little bugger -- an ascending 9.8% grade immediately followed by a descending 13.4% grade. Whew. I could tell I was exhausted, so I slowed way down (reaction time? What's that?), causing Peter to tailgate me a little. Bad leader. I didn't really care by this point, though. I made a mental note not to do Hicks Road on the real ride: I was way too tired to be officially leading people through twisties.
As we neared the end of Hicks Road, a black flash in the air caught my attention. I looked up to see a huge black military plane leading a formation of four black military helicopters. Looks like I wasn't the only one out practicing my leading skills that day. The plane led the 'copters in a couple of lazy circles and then off towards the northwest, assumedly to Moffet Field. We saw the helicopters later, when we were on the freeway heading home, but the plane was nowhere to be seen. Peter never saw it; only the 'copters. It was a nice sight for me, though, and I appreciated that huge black plane, from one leader to another.
Fun with map granularity:
Peter didn't see the plane because he probably has a government implant blocking his memory of the event. Those black helicopters are what beam the thought waves. Try covering your bike and your helmet in tin foil to repel the government thought waves.
Posted by: James | Monday, April 04, 2005 at 12:30 PM
LOL - the first paragraph is how the ride in California was for me in October! Never again.
Posted by: jamie | Monday, April 04, 2005 at 12:39 PM
Fabulous ride. I'm glad you've posted the map route.
Because I feel just as wonderful about riding in the group as you do about leading it. I can't tell you how much fun it is to ride when people behind you are obviously grading your performance through every line.
As far as hiking, maybe we should take four wheels there some weekend so that we could actually stop and walk around for a few hours?
Posted by: Stephanie | Tuesday, April 05, 2005 at 10:08 AM
Steph: sounds good! I was also thinking of just tossing on the Givi bags -- since Mt Madonna has actual restrooms, we could change into hiking gear there and put bike gear in the locking bags. (Kim, are you reading this too? Hiking party?)
Posted by: carolyn | Tuesday, April 05, 2005 at 11:00 AM
I went for a fabulous ride down south of Hollister on 25 last weekend and we encountered the same butterfly horde. My friend Teri ate one before she had a chance to pull down her face shield, and then we had to stop and dig one out that somehow got caught between her helmet and shield. And awhile later, she somehow got a bee inside her helmet, stunned and unmoving but for the disconcerting wiggling of his little legs which she could see out of the corner of her eye. With all that, she still said it was the best day she'd had in 3 months... But re the butterflies, they are migrating painted ladies that are having a population explosion this year due to all the rain and abundant wildflowers. It was such a mess I took a photo of the front of my bike after I got home, it was covered with orange-yellow splatters, as were my gloves. Hey! We saw a dead wild boar by the side of the road, too, I'm sure glad we didn't come by that spot any sooner. Here's a link re the butterflies:
http://www.davisenterprise.com/articles/2005/04/02/news/277new1.txt
Posted by: Laura | Thursday, April 07, 2005 at 01:55 PM
An alternative to Uvas Rd is a parallel eastern branch which meanders through some nice million-dollar vineyard estates. From Chitactac Adams, go north on Watsonville, skip the G8 left to Uvas Rd but keep right for another 0.5 mile. Take a left to Sycamore Dr, left at Oak Glen Av, then at the 2.6 mile mark Oak Glen veers left while straight becomes Llagas. Take the Oak Glen Av left. This will dump you back to Uvas Rd after reaching the northern tip of Chesbro Reservoir. There is a biker bar [mainly Harleys] along Chesbro.
The view is better along this route. You're riding through shades along some narrow 2-lane roads. Much fewer law enforcement than G8. Give it a try one of these days.
Posted by: Ichabod | Saturday, April 09, 2005 at 10:08 AM
Here's a map http://home.jps.net/~timbuktu2/Public/oak.gif
Posted by: Ichabod | Saturday, April 09, 2005 at 10:13 AM
Sweet! Thanks so much for the tip! *thumbs up*
Posted by: carolyn | Saturday, April 09, 2005 at 10:18 AM
Sorry, I'm a few days late. I'm all for a hiking party :D
Posted by: Kim | Saturday, April 09, 2005 at 02:42 PM
That other Summit road you mentioned.. The "private" one that's ten miles in from the intersection of Pole Line and Mt. Modonna, is in fact NOT a private road at all (though the locals would like you to beleive it is). It's a county road that for some reason the county doesn't want to maintain, so the locals started the SRA (Summit Road Association) which gathers donations from the residents to maintian the road.
The next time you accidentally ride the ten miles to the gate... Keep going, the road is dirt all the way to Loma Prieta Road. A left on Loma Prieta will in turn drop you off on Highland at Mt Bache.
Posted by: John Burton | Sunday, April 10, 2005 at 11:22 PM
Oh, sweet! I've been to the other end at Loma Prieta Road, but didn't feel like taking the SVS down a dirt road that day.
My local map claims that there's a gate up by Loma Prieta Road -- is this also a lie? ;)
Sounds like I should investigate via Serow this weekend.
Posted by: carolyn | Monday, April 11, 2005 at 01:10 PM