Big Basin through the Back Door

Bill Bushnell – Sunday, November 7, 1993

After a brief night of confusing dreams I awaken at 2:45 and prepare for the day’s bike ride. After eating breakfast, and getting dressed, I take a short nap before riding off to Gunn High School where the ride is to start at 6:00.

The morning air is cold, and only the faintest suggestion of sunrise casts the eastern sky a dark blue. I ride south on Middlefield, and since no one is about at this hour, I take Oregon Expressway to El Camino Real and then head south on El Camino to Gunn.

When I arrive I see a car in the parking lot. Surely no one is crazy enough to go on this ride with me at 6:00 on a cold November morning! As I approach the parking lot, I see a bicycle and a figure in the car. I recognize neither the person nor the car.

“Are you Karen Davis?”, I ask the figure.

“Yes. And you must be Bill Bushnell.”, a female voice replies.

Karen had asked me about the ride via email earlier in the week saying that she might participate.

We wait for another ten minutes in the cold air in the unlikely event other intrepid souls might come to ride. No one else comes.

We start up Arastradero Rd., stopping briefly for a potty break at the preserve parking lot. The sky is just beginning to get light. We continue to Alpine Rd. and then turn right and climb Alpine Rd. to Skyline. I have mustered the courage now to ride down the bypass at the lower gate on Alpine Rd. I tend to be spooked by steep drop-offs that are within falling distance.

We continue up the dirt road in the cold air. At Gunn the temperature was 42F, but when we reach Skyline the air is a comfortable 65F. We peel a layer or two before beginning the bumpy descent down the west side of Alpine Rd.

We continue on Camp Pomponio Rd. We descend rapidly into frigid air. When I reach the gate at Bridge Trail, I’m freezing. A look at the thermometer shows the air temperature at 40F.

In several places on the way down, I disturb bevies of quail. These high-strung birds (California State Bird) lie low until one is nearly upon them. Then in an alarmed and sudden movement they take to the air, beating their small wings rapidly and noisily as they hoist their heavy bodies into the air.

We continue on the Bridge Trail, and after warning Karen not to let her wheels fall into the cracks between the lengthwise planks, we cross Pescadero Creek and ascend the steep hill on the other side. At Old Haul Rd. we turn right and continue rapidly toward its termination at Wurr Rd.

Old Haul Rd. is as smooth as new pavement and relatively dust-free. It becomes a mud-bog in the wintertime. At Wurr Rd. we stop and take our first snack break.

After eating we continue on Wurr Rd. and then Pescadero Rd. to Butano Cutoff and Cloverdale Rd. The weather is warm and inviting along Cloverdale Rd., but when we head up the canyon into Butano State Park to top off our water bottles and to use the potty, the temperature drops 20F.

Three weeks ago I climbed the very steep and soft Olmo Trail with another group, but this week we plan to climb into Big Basin State Park via Gazos Creek Rd. I have always ridden west on Gazos Creek Rd., but I was surprised how beautiful this road is when riding east. When descending east down the steep canyon, one doesn’t have time to look about and appreciate the beauty of the dark forest.

Gazos Creek Rd. is paved up to Villa Cathay, just before the road begins its steep climb to Sandy Point Junction. We pass a group of several mountain bikers.

One of them exclaims to us, “I didn’t know you could ride a road bike here!”

The last time I rode Gazos Creek Rd. was last March after weeks of a wetter-than-normal year. Now the road is smooth and only a little bit dusty in spots. There’s no reason not to ride a road bike.

At Sandy Point we continue on Whitehouse Canyon Rd. Whitehouse Canyon Rd. is as smooth as a runway right now, though I suspect it could be very bumpy later in the season after the rains have had a chance to deepen the water channels in the road surface.

We turn on Chalks Rd. and ascend the impressive-looking first hill.

Chalks Rd. is a true roller coaster. There’s hardly a level section. In contrast, Whitehouse Canyon Rd. seems level. Since the surface is relatively free of sand pits and deep ruts, I let myself fly down some of the descents, using the momentum to help get me up the next steep grade.

Halfway up the final grade to the summit I notice a distance sign.

Chalk Mountain is 0.5 miles, but something else is 6.0 miles away. The destination is covered with a brown metal plate, but I can barely discern a C underneath as I peek through the crack. It appears that the trail from Chalk Mountain to Cascade Ranch may soon be opening up. If I were alone, I might explore this interesting route to the coast.

At the summit we relax and eat lunch in the hot sun. The last time I was on Chalk Mountain was two days after Christmas last year as a storm was moving in off the ocean. Then the wind was blowing fiercely. Today there’s barely a puff of air.

We return to Sandy Point as we had come. At Sandy Point we head east on Gazos Creek Rd. About a half-mile from Sandy Point we pass a group of three road bikers coming the other way. I don’t recognize them. One of them wears a Stanford team jersey, and another is a woman wearing a Pearl Izumi jersey. One of them rides a large frame trek road bike. They don’t strike me as the type who would allow themselves to take their road bikes on dirt roads, especially as their bikes and clothing look relatively clean. But, in a way it’s nice to see others venture onto dirt with their road bikes, and better yet if they didn’t drive their bikes on their cars to the start. Besides, I can’t think of a better time of year to ride Gazos Creek Rd. We barely have time to say “Hello.” before we pass.

At Big Basin Park HQ, we stop at the store and eat a snack. The air is surprisingly warm.

After resting for about 20 minutes we continue on CA-236 toward Boulder Creek. After cresting the low pass at Little Basin Rd., we enjoy the long, gradual downgrade into Boulder Creek.

Without stopping we continue on Bear Creek Rd. Things go fine until we begin the long, steep climb up to Skyline Blvd. Bear Creek Rd. is a fun descent, but it’s a tough climb, especially late in the ride. I shift into the 27-inch gear and spin away. Karen says she just watched my wheel the whole way up. She later told me that she wished I hadn’t ticked of the distance to the top. The tough climb on Bear Creek Rd. ends about 1.5 miles from the actual junction with Skyline Blvd., but Karen didn’t know or remember this.

At Skyline Blvd., we both stop for a snack and a brief sit-down rest. About 15 minutes later we rise and continue the journey north on Skyline.

Just as we start riding, a lone woman on a bicycle turns the corner and begins climbing Skyline Blvd. just in front of us. Her speed is moderately slow, but as we’re both tired, and I don’t have the willpower to pass, I just hang back. She seems inexperienced as she is somewhat nervous with my following closely. As the road begins a short steep climb up to the Christmas Tree farms, she makes a faulty shift and apologizes nervously for slowing down.

“Don’t worry about it.”, I say. “Where are you heading? Are you going to Highway 9?”

“Oh, I don’t know. I think that’s where I’m going. How much climbing is there between here and Hwy 9?”, she answers.

“About a thousand feet.”, I answer.

Her climbing speed is too slow for me to comfortably match, so I pass. I think of hanging back and asking her if she’s heading down to Los Gatos or Saratoga and if so suggesting that she continue to CA-9 and descend that way rather than the cumbersome route around Lexington and down the dirt path. But maybe she just parked her car at Summit Rd. and CA-17. She seemed mighty tentative, and she didn’t seem to know where she was, and the sun was getting lower in the sky. But not wanting to appear patronizing or too eager to help, I continue on with Karen.

We continue up to the first turn-out after Skyline crests near Castle Rock. We both eat, rest, and put on a layer of clothing for the cool, gradual descent to Saratoga Gap. Just as we are about to begin riding again, the woman we saw earlier rides by with another man.

“Oh well. I guess she’s not alone after all.”, I think.

But then I realize the man riding with her looks vaguely familiar. Very quickly I process the information—yellow, large-frame bike, no water bottles, tall rider with long legs and about the right age, cycling cap instead of helmet—and blurt out, “Jobst?”

The man turns quickly and stops. The woman turns around saying, “I think I’ll turn back now.”

“Yes? And you are...?” “Bill Bushnell.”, I answer.

I have run into Jobst Brandt only once before that I can remember, and he wasn’t on his bike at the time.

For the next twenty minutes we talk about various bike stuff. Where we’ve been, where we should have gone, the latest netnews exchanges, flat tires, spoke tension, tensiometers, glued-frame bikes, bike lights, unlit tunnels in the Alps, and other topics. When Jobst gets on his bike his loquacity factor must go up. It’s difficult to get a word in edgewise. Finally when there’s a break, I manage to introduce my riding partner, Karen.

The talk break is beneficial as it gives us renewed strength for the trip home. We begin riding downhill toward Saratoga Gap. Jobst points out that he will ride his current gear all the way home “since it’s all downhill from here.” It looks like a 52x12 or some other impossibly high gear. There are still some significant hills to climb, especially if he continues to Page Mill Rd. on Skyline. Along the way as we pass milepost 12.0 he points out that the crests of all the hills on Skyline occur at even mile-posts.

When we reach Saratoga Gap, Jobst continues without stopping through the the intersection, much like another riding partner, Brent “Lose-no-momentum” Silver, used to. I remember that Karen wanted to descend CA-9 instead of Page Mill, so I stop and wait for her. When Jobst reaches the other side, I point downhill, and he waves goodbye. I would like to have seen how Jobst coped with the brief but significant upgrades in his high gear.

A minute later Karen arrives, and just as we begin to get back on our bikes, I discover that my rear tire is soft. Fortunately, Jobst has ridden on, so I don’t have to suffer the indignity of a lecture on how to fix a flat in 5 minutes—and in front of all the assembled mountain bikers, too! It is ironic as we had just been talking about getting flats. I find I get flats much more frequently when I ride with others and try to hold a conversation while riding. I guess I don’t watch the road as carefully as I ought.

Since I’m tired, and I’m not in a race, I work slowly. I discover the cause of my flat is David Casseres’s best friend, a short (10mm), thin wire that I find, painfully, after rubbing the inside of the casing in search of the culprit. I don’t think I would have seen this even if I had been watching.

Fifteen minutes later, with a new tube in the tire, we descend CA-9 and Redwood Gulch. By the time we reach I-280 it is dark, and we turn on our headlights. After a short ride up Foothill Expressway we reach Gunn High School. It is as many minutes after sunset as it was before sunrise when we began the ride.

distance: 110.1 miles

climbing: 9890 feet

total time: 13:10

riding time: 8:57

average speed: 12.3 mph

maximum speed: 39.5 mph

index: 150

irp: 11.4

mirp: 16.7

climbing density: 90 feet/mi

An article on indexing can be found here.

©2004, Bill Bushnell

Please do not publish or distribute for profit without permission.