Where’s Washington?

Why doesn’t Bestrides cover Washington state?  The answer is, I don’t think the riding is good enough.   I’ve done a fair amount of riding there, and it’s often nice, but it can’t match the two states below it.  Sorry, Washingtonians.

I know of five Washington rides that are worth traveling a distance to do.   On the east side of Mt. Rainier there are two roads going into the park.  One ends at the Sunrise Visitor Center.  The other goes to the Paradise Visitor Center (and continues west through and out of the park, though I’m not recommending the west half because it’s heavily trafficked).   At the northern border of the state, the Mt. Baker Highway climbs up to Artist’s Point and dead-ends there.  All three rides are out and backs through splendid scenery, long, fairly monotonous climbs followed by long, fairly monotonous descents.  The vistas are as good as anything you’ll see anywhere.  The pitches are all moderate, hour after hour.  Mt. Baker is the hardest climb.  The ride to Sunrise has the best descending.  The ride to Paradise has the grandest scenery.  All three rides are on roads that are pretty popular with cars, so a weekday morning is recommended.  All three can be closed by snow, so check road conditions before going.  Through much of the summer on snowy years the Mt. Baker road is free of snow only to Austin Pass (5.6 miles short of the road’s end), in which case I would wait, since those last 5.6 miles are by far the most rewarding.

The fourth ride I like is in the San Juan Islands, an archipelago of gentle, flat, domesticated islands between the city of Vancouver and the island of Vancouver.  The islands are all connected by small ferries that welcome cyclists.  Every island has its charming little village or two and is criss-crossed by easy, pleasant roads through fields of small-farm agriculture (I once saw a man plowing a field behind a team of horses), with occasional views of the sea and adjacent islands.  It’s pretty much paradise if you’re looking for mellow, but it’s more about being there than riding.  The one great ride in the islands is Orcas Island.  Orcas is shaped like a horseshoe, and the ferry drops you at one end.  Ride the main road most of the way to the other end of the horseshoe, where you’ll find the San Juans’ only real hill, and it’s a pip: Mt. Constitution.  Climb it and let the spectacular panoramic views at the top take your breath away.  Then ride back.

The fifth ride, Hurricane Ridge Road, in Olympic National Park, is a famous climb I have only driven.  It dead-ends at the Hurricane Ridge Visitor Center.  Like the first three rides, it’s a long out-and-back slog, with a road contour even more featureless than the others, again with spectacular scenery, and sporting a serious traffic problem.  Expect a shoulder ride much the way.

A trustworthy friend of Bestrides says that Windy Ridge is wonderful.

An excellent guide to these and 70 other Washington rides is Mike McQuaide’s 75 Classic Rides Washington (The Mountaineers Books).

Oregon and California Regions

Oregon
Northern California Coast
Northern California Inland
Northern Gold Country
Southern Gold Country and Sierra
Wine Country
Marin
Bay Area
Monterey Bay
Southern California
Eastern Sierra

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Cycling Oregon

For Californians, the cycling in Oregon is an under-utilized treasure. The southwestern forests are virgin and lush. The Willamette Valley is the aesthetic standard by which all agricultural regions are measured. The coastal highway is far less hectic than Highway 1 down south and dotted with charming small towns. The road surfaces are uniformly excellent—if there’s a pothole in Oregon, I haven’t been able to find it.  Oregonians don’t litter, and you never see broken glass.  Because Oregon still has a vigorous logging industry, there are roads everywhere, to accommodate the logging trucks. The cars are driven by friendly and courteous folks. And the back roads are free of traffic like almost nowhere in California. The climbs are less fierce—pitches above 6% are rare.  Some Oregonians refer to Oregon from Bend south as “Northern Northern California,” and I recommend you adopt that attitude if you’re a Californian rider.

Most strikingly different are the two state’s coasts.  California’s Hwy 1 is a cyclist’s nightmare, heavily trafficked by generally hostile drivers, mostly up and down, with very few communities for respite, and the few roads that head east from Hwy 1 tend to be vertical.  Oregon’s Hwy 101 is a much more tranquil, flatter, less busy, friendlier road with lots of charming small communities and lots of mellow roads heading east from it along essentially flat rivers.

Because Oregon loves its cyclists, it’s probably the best state in the Union for cycling maps. Once there was a beautiful thing called the Lane County Bicycle Map, which covered Eugene, Oakridge, six or seven of the rides in our list, and dozens of other good rides. It also mapped out eleven prime rides in the area, with elevation profiles and descriptions. Pure bliss. Sadly it is no more, killed by the internet.  You can see a copy of it online here—note that the map itself and maps of specific rides are separate links.  Many other state regions have their own cycling maps, most of them downloadable. There is also an excellent cyclist’s guide to the entire coast, the Oregon Coast Bicycle Route Map, free from the ODOT and available at Oregon Welcome Centers. It even tells you the direction of the prevailing winds.  The state has also laid out for you seventeen Scenic Bikeways (not to be confused with the Scenic Byways below), almost none of which is covered in Bestrides,  but which are certainly worth considering.

You’ll notice there are no rides in our list from the eastern side of Oregon. That’s because pretty much everything east of Bend is desert—dry, monotonous, and barren to my eye. Some riders—those who like great distances, moonscapes, and solitude—like it out there, especially the area around and north of Baker and John Day. If you’re one of them you might consult the Oregon Scenic Byways website for routes. Jim Moore (below) also has some excellent suggestions. But it’s not my kind of riding.

The basic online source for Oregon riding is Rideoregonride.com. Like all such sites, it seems to miss most of the great backcountry routes, so if you limit yourself to its suggestions you’ll probably end up riding the merely good, but it’s worth a look.

Since I created this site, I discovered Jim Moore’s 75 Classic Rides Oregon: the Best Road Biking Routes from Mountaineers Books. It’s simply the best road riding guide to anywhere I’ve ever seen. I recently did a nineteen-ride car trip through Oregon based almost entirely on its suggestions, and it never let me down. It contains (usually in altered form) many of the Oregon rides in this website. I would begin any exploration of Oregon’s riding riches there. When one of my rides is covered in Moore’s book I mention it at the beginning of the write-up.

An Oregon native writes, “You write that “Oregon has few really steep pitches,” which I disagree with—I now live in Sandy, surround by ridge lines and sharp drop downs and ups to the Sandy River, and most of the routes I found have numerous half-mile 10%+ pitches.  The Barlow Trail Route you mention, back to Sandy, has a few of them.   Most of my rides come close to (or exceed) the 100’ for every mile guide.   I found much flatter and gradual climbing in Northern California.

“Re your section on Oregon, you are also mostly spot on.  The road surfaces compared to Northern California are excellent, the roads are very clean, cars and noise rattling old pickups constantly swing wide when passing, and the back roads are free of traffic.    Note they are also free of places to get water.  I loved riding in the desolate Gold Country (Sutter Creek-Volcano-Cook Station) in California and about every 10 miles I knew there would be a park with water or a general store.   In Oregon the parks rarely have water, and a town on the map consists of two houses and a church (e.g., Aims, but scores of others)—and maybe a closed firehouse.   

“Oregon compared to California in a nutshell: the natural beauty is incredible but the man-made stuff leaves something to be desired.    While Oregon is filled with incredibly courteous motor vehicles it is incredibly desolate and you need to carry more supplies (I now carry a third water bottle) and, unlike the Bay Area where you are continually seeing other cyclists, I’m lucky if I see 2-3 on any ride.”

Oregon rides, north to south:
Hood River to The Dalles
Vernonia to Astoria
Three Capes Ride
Lolo Pass Back Road
Silver Falls
Siletz Bay to Newport Inland
Alpine to Alsea
Marys Peak Road
Shotgun Creek Road
Beyond Yellowbottom
Quartzville Road
Sweet Creek Road
Gardiner to Eugene
Eagle’s Rest Road
McKenzie Pass
Aufderheide Highway
North Fork Siuslaw Road
Briggs Hill Road/McBeth Road Loop
Siuslaw River Road
Burnt Mountain Road/Tioga Creek Road
Elk River Road
Brice Creek Road
Galice to Golden
Crater Lake
Tour de Fronds
Gold Beach Century
West Fork Evans Creek Road Etc.
Dead Indian Loop
Old Siskiyou Highway

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Cycling the Northern California Coast

The Northern California coast, for cyclists, is Hwy 1, which is solely for touring riders, and a lot of roads that take off from Hwy 1 and all do roughly the same thing: immediately climb like mad into lush coastal forest, then roll up and down eastward through the many ridges of the Coast Range. (If you’re riding west from Hwy 101 or another of the inland north-south highways, the profile is reversed, of course.) I’ve given you four such rides (plus one ride that’s slightly inland). There are lots more rides leaving Hwy 1, and they’re all fine adventures I encourage you to explore.  Just look on the map for any road leaving Hwy 1 heading east, make sure it’s paved, then head down (or rather up) the road.

Krebs has a good map covering this area.

Northern California Coast Rides:
Avenue of the Giants
Leggett to the Sea
Branscomb Road
Mendocino/Comptche
Philo-Greenwood Road
Mountain View Road
Tin Barn Road/Annapolis Road
Mendocino Coastal
Comptche to Ukiah
Sacramento River Trail

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Cycling Northern California Inland

“Northern California” always seems to be a default category: if it isn’t coastal and it isn’t the Gold Country and it isn’t urban, it’s “Northern California.” So it is here. There is nothing these rides have in common except they’re north of San Francisco, they’re in an area without a familiar label, and they’re all good.

Northern California Inland rides:

Forks of Salmon
Mt. Shasta Climbs
Indian Valley
Mill Creek Road
Lassen National Park
Warner Valley Road/Juniper Lake Road
Wildcat Road
Igo-Ono
Highway 32 Canyons
Lumpkin Road
Paradise to Butte Meadows
Table Mountain
Concow Road
Oroville to Forbestown
Clear Lake to Cobb
Wooden Valley/Pleasants Valley
Paskenta Loop
Bald Rock Road
Covelo Road
Scott River Road
Trinity Center to Callahan
Salmon River Road
Lower Colfax Road/Rollins Lake Loop

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Cycling the Northern Gold Country

“Northern Gold Country” I define as everything north of Hwy 50 and east of Hwy 80. A lot of it is very good stuff—almost any road in the triangle formed by 50, 80, and an imaginary line running due north from Pollock Pines is worth riding. But honestly, the riding south of Hwy 50 is usually better. The rides in our Southern Gold Country list just scratch the surface of the fine riding in the area, whereas these six rides are all I can truly call special there. But I stand by those six.

For a discussion of the Gold Country’s on-going project to improve cycling infrastructure, see “Southern Gold Country and Sierra” below.

Northern Gold Country rides:
Red Dog/Pasquale
Iowa Hill Road
Mosquito Road
Mosquito Ridge Road
Dog Bar Road
Lincoln Hills
Prospectors Road to Bayne Road
Willow Valley Road Loop

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Cycling the Southern Gold Country and Sierra

The Gold Country below Hwy 50 is one of the greatest cycling destinations in California.  It’s a volume thing.  From Placerville south to Jamestown, for 75 miles, everything on the east side of Hwy 49—everything—is worth riding, and much on the west side of 49 as well, incredible as that may sound. So the few routes I give you in this region vastly under-represent the opportunities. Think of it as a starter kit for the area. I’ll tell you about some great routes and encourage you to explore everything else. And I’ve favored the more off-the-radar routes, the ones you’re less likely to stumble upon on your own. But go make your own discoveries.   

The Gold Country is undergoing something of a cycling renaissance, thanks to the Mother Lode Bike Coalition and CalBike, who have helped the State develop a plan to spend $14 million on improving road surfaces damaged by the area’s devastating fires in recent years.  CalBike’s website has a list of roads scheduled for resurfacing, with a completion date of 2023.  Jesus Maria Road, one of Bestrides’s favorite rides, has just been resurfaced.  Now I ask you, in how many places where you ride are the locals actively cultivating your business?   Show your appreciation by planning a riding vacation in the area…and wear your cycling kit into the motel and the shops while you’re there so they’ll know their efforts are paying off.

80% of the area is beautifully mapped by AAA’s Gold Country regional map, and I encourage you to get it, however much you like Internet mapping sites. Just remember to check to make sure the road is paved before heading out. The maps won’t always tell you—for instance, Dogtown Rd. is a good ride, but San Domingo Rd., from Dogtown Rd. to Sheep Ranch Rd., is a gorgeous, but dirt, road—perfect for your mountain bike.  On the AAA map they look the same.  Often the maps are simply wrong—the Benchmark atlas of the area says that Hawyer Rd. is paved and Old Gulch Rd. is dirt, whereas it’s the other way around.  As always, the surest information about road surface is on RidewithGPS—map the road in question and the map will indicate the percentage of pavement, and be right about 95% of the time.

The layout of the terrain is dead simple. Hwy 49 runs north and south a bit uphill (eastward) into the Sierra foothills. Everything to the west is rolling grassy farmland, all very much the same, pretty and perfect for a lazy bucolic roll (before the summer heat sets in). If you want to ride out there, the best roads are Sutter-Ione Rd and Stony Creek Rd, so try to include them in your route. The century that covers this area is the Party Pardee, a spring metric put on by the Sacramento Bike Hikers, and it’s a joyful, great-hearted century I totally endorse and ride every year even though the roads themselves are merely very nice—not special enough for our list. Everything to the east of 49 is more hilly, and it gets more and more hilly the further east you go (Hwy 4 famously hits 24%) until you’re on the spine of the Sierra. So every road that runs east runs uphill, every road that runs west runs downhill, and every road east of 49 that runs north and south is a series of ups and downs as it crosses a series of creek canyons and ridges running perpendicular to your route. So you can pick your difficulty level: west of 49, easy; east of 49, hard; further east of 49, harder.

Remember our general rule: avoid roads with numbers. All the highways have double or triple the traffic of the back roads. Hwy 49 itself is the worst—it’s almost always unpleasantly trafficky. But sometimes you have to go there, because that’s where the supplies are or because you need to complete the last leg of a loop. So be it. Hwy 4 is the next worst.

Seasons matter here. You can ride the Gold Country all year round, but when you ride has a big effect on the experience. Since all Gold Country riding is up and down, I wouldn’t want to ride it in the wet, which means you have to watch the weather report closely in the spring and definitely wait for a dry weather window in the winter. The Gold Country is Sacramento and the Bay Area’s favorite summer playground, so the earlier or later in the year you ride, the less obnoxious the crowds and traffic will be. Spring is manic anywhere near Daffodil Hill. Fall is beautiful but everywhere you ride will be plagued by eye flies, those little black gnats that hover in front of your face. The summer is surprisingly hot. Mountains = cool, right? The Sierra Century, from which our Cream of the Sierra Century ride is drawn, is run in the summer, and it’s often flirting with 100-degree temperatures even at its highest elevations. Just put all this info in the hopper and make your choice. The Ebbetts Pass ride and the higher sections of the Carson Pass Plus ride and the Yosemite tour are closed by snow in the winter.

Part of the allure of the Gold Country—the reason why the Bay Area non-cyclists are here—is the large number of charming towns. Sutter Creek, Amador City, Mokelumne Hill (muh KULL uh mee), Murphy’s, Angel’s Camp, Volcano, Columbia—they’re all rewarding places to hang out in, especially Murphy’s, Sutter Creek, and Columbia. These three are a little precious, a little theme-park-ish, but it works. Many of these towns lie on Hwy 49, which is why we don’t want to ride there. Lodging in the area can be quite upscale, but there are mom-and-pop motels to be found, and a number of quaint restored hotels (in Volcano, Jackson, and Mokelumne Hill, for starters) that are fun and can be inexpensive.

In the summer of 2015, the Butte Fire burned a vast tract of prime riding land south and east of Mokelumne Hill.  As with all fires, the routes are now often damaged but still worth riding.

I’ve included the 6 Sierra rides in this section because I didn’t want a section with only 6 rides, and because the Sierra rides cover a vast territory (getting from Yosemite to the Bestrides nearest it to the south, Kings Canyon, is a 7.5-hr drive, for instance) so they don’t really constitute a region. There are many famous roads in the Sierra that aren’t here (circumnavigating Tahoe, Tioga Pass, the area around Bishop, the area east of Mammoth), because I don’t think they’re good enough—all too trafficky, too tedious, or too doggedly hard. You can find the hardest of them at pjamm cycling, including Onion Valley Road, the hardest ride in California.

Southern Gold Country and Sierra rides:
North South Road
Carson Pass Plus
Blue Lakes Road
Ebbetts Pass
Cream of the Sierra Century
Clinton Road
Jesus Maria Road
Ward’s Ferry Road
Yosemite Tour
Kings Canyon
South Upper Truckee Road
Priest-Coulterville Road
Old Ward’s Ferry Road Et. Al.
Spicer Reservoir Road
Big Trees Parkway
Bear Valley to Mosquito Lake

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Cycling the Wine Country

The Wine Country (the Napa and Sonoma Valleys and surroundings) is probably the area of California most populated with tourists on a summer weekend day (Yosemite may be worse—not sure). The traffic is about as “rural” as downtown San Francisco. And the drivers have come to drink. So you have to use your wits to ride there. Follow one simple rule: don’t ride on any road with a highway number. That means, stay off Hwys 101, 128, and 29. That’s a loss. Hwy 128 east of the Silverado Trail would be a great ride if they closed it to cars. But we can’t have everything, and once we agree to stay off the big highways there’s plenty of splendid riding left to us on the back roads that wander up into the hills lining both valleys, where the cars and tour buses full of tipsy wine tourists never go. To quote Walter Huston in “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre”: “Up there! Up there’s where we’ve got to go!”

Anything that goes east/west from one valley to another would probably be great riding—beautiful, challenging, curvy—were it not for the traffic, which can be fierce, so try to find roads that aren’t main arteries.  For instance, Hwy 29 from Middletown to Calistoga is a gorgeous road, but it’s solid cars, no shoulder, and no room for passing—in other words, a nightmare for cyclists.  Similarly, Calistoga Road/Petrified Forest Road from Calistoga to Santa Rosa is beautiful, but again it’s the main artery between two fairly large and active towns, so traffic can be daunting.  And so it goes.  That’s why all the good routes are either dead ends (Pine Flat Road), loops that leave a valley and return (Geysers Road), or less-used alternates to busier roads (Sweetwater Springs Road).

Since the good roads always climb up from the valley, all the rides in this section have serious climbing. If you’re looking for something more mellow but still want to avoid the traffic of the wine roads, check out the rides in the Adding Miles section of the Pine Flat Road ride.

Sonoma County would be in the running for Best Place to Ride a Bike in California were it not for two things:

1. There are no shoulders.  There must be a law prohibiting shoulders in Napa and Sonoma Counties.  Since the roads are narrow and winding, this means that any traffic at all is problematic.

2. The road surfaces are uniformly bad once you get off the heavily trafficked routes.  Not just imperfect—often a real impediment to one’s riding pleasure.  Every Wine Country ride in Bestrides except Mt. Veeder Road and Cavedale, which were poor but have recently been resurfaced, and Hopland Road, which is a well-used connector, has serious road surface issues.  If your bike will run larger tires, you’ll want them.  Marin County, just to the south, has consistently good to excellent road surfaces, which may be an argument for riding there.

The Wine Country is also one of the most expensive places to rent lodgings in California. There are some not-so-horrific options: 1) stay in Rohnert Park, where there are a lot of cheap motels (in both senses) at the Hwy 101/Rohnert Park Expressway interchange; 2) find an airbnb in Santa Rosa; 3) camp at the KOA in Cloverdale; 4) find one of the few inexpensive places actually in the Wine Country, like the Calistoga Hotel; 5) find a cheap Airbnb. Remember, if it’s cheap, there’s always a reason.

Krebs has a good map covering this area.

The Santa Rosa Cycling Club has a friendly website with a page called “Ten Great Rides.”  It’s a great source for regional riding.  Each ride is lovingly described, mapped, and linked to a RWGPS map.  

Wine Country rides:

Pine Flat Road
Sweetwater Springs Road
King’s Ridge
Coleman Valley Road
Mt. Veeder Road
Geysers Road
Hopland Road
Old Howell Mountain Road to Ink Grade
Cavedale Road
Bohemian Highway Loop
Occidental Loop

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Cycling Marin

These rides are all close enough to the Golden Gate Bridge to be folded into the Bay Area section of the list, if geography were everything. But, as anyone in the Bay Area will tell you, it isn’t the Bay—it’s Marin. It’s a state of mind thing.

Pretty much all of the small roads in Marin are pretty good, and much of it is pretty indistinguishable.  Here are the five rides that rise above the norm.  See the Adding Miles discussions for each to see other possibilities.

Whereas Sonoma County is almost without decent road surfaces, all the Marin rides listed here have good surface.  I don’t know why that is.

Krebs has a good map covering this area.

Marin rides:
Pt. Reyes Lighthouse
Mt. Tamalpais
Chileno Valley Road/Tomales Bay Loop
Limantour Road
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Cycling the Bay Area

To those who have never been, the Bay Area of the mind’s eye is like Coruscant in Star Wars—solid metropolis, endless urban hive. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Yes, the Bay itself has a lot of urban steel along its shoreline, but just behind that steel curtain in all directions lie magnificent cycling roads through farmland, dense woods, or wild grassland. And because the Bay’s flatland has a hilly spine to the west and east, those roads usually involve world-class climbing. The names for some of the climbs are the stuff of legend: Mt. Hamilton. Mt. Diablo. The Bay riding can stand up to that of any place in the world (four of the Best of the Best rides are from this region). Yes, the traffic can be horrific, but BART helps (see BART discussion below). And yes, lodging is pricey. Luckily my brother lives there.

Four of our East Bay rides—Grizzly Peak Blvd to Redwood Ave., Palomares Rd., Calaveras Rd., and Sierra Rd./Felter Rd.—are legs of the Best of the Bay Century, a wonderful century with (obviously) outstanding riding, but also wonderful food and a uniquely cheerful, friendly temperament. They actually greet me by my first name, and I’m from out of town! It’s also the only century I know of that’s one-way—you ride straight south, then jump on BART to return to your starting place.

Riding in the Bay Area is all about using the Bay Area Rapid Transit System, the region’s subway. BART goes by many of the rides in our list, and they’re happy to have you and your bike on board. This means you can park somewhere safe (like a BART station) or lodge somewhere cheap (like Pittsburg) and ride BART to your ride, or you can BART to the start of the ride and end at another BART station.

You can take a bike on any BART train at any time, in any car except the first one.  But the cars are jammed at rush hours, and handling a bike in those crushes will make you a lot of enemies and put you in a very bad mood, so try to avoid those times.  BART users are happy to walk you though the process of buying a BART pass and using it, so just ask anyone nearby how it works.  Bikes aren’t allowed on the escalators.  There are elevators, but they’re tiny, unpleasant, and slow, so you’ll probably end up climbing (a lot of) stairs.   At almost every bank of turnstiles, there’s an extra-wide one just for you that makes it easy to pass through with your bike.  Keep track of where you are en route—the name of the station is often unreadable from your seat.

Krebs has a good map covering this area.  For any riding in San Francisco proper, The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency has prepared for you the SF Bike Network Map, detailing all bike routes, lanes, and such.  You can request a paper version by mail.

Bay Area rides:
Golden Gate Bridge Loop
San Francisco’s Wiggle Loop
Grizzly Peak Boulevard to Redwood Road
Palomares Road
Calaveras Road
Sierra Road/Felter Road
Mt. Diablo
Morgan Territory Road
Mt. Hamilton
Purissima Creek Road
Pescadero/Tunitas Creek Road
Del Puerto Canyon Road
Carquinez Loop
Mill Creek Road #2
Conzelman Loop
Wildcat Canyon/Happy Valley Road/Nimitz Way
Cañada Road Plus
Tunnel Road/Claremont Ave. Loop
East Dunne Avenue
Dirty Moody

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Cycling Monterey Bay

I’ve included the rides in the Hollister area in the Monterey Bay section—a bit of a stretch, but it’s only a short drive (c. 25 miles) away.

Monterey Bay itself is a wonderful place, or rather two wonderful places, Santa Cruz and Monterey. They’re almost an hour’s car trip apart, and they couldn’t be more different as riding destinations. The hills above Santa Cruz may well be the greatest cycling destination on the West Coast—a network of marvelous cycling roads weaving their way up and down (very up and down) through lush California coastal Redwood forest.  Here you can take a map and wander freely, knowing wherever you ride will be good. I’ve given you six great routes, but there are many other good roads, so here’s a list of all the good roads I know in the Santa Cruz area—I suggest you take a paper map, highlight all of them, then invent routes that link several together.  I’ve included roads in our three rides (other than Big Basin), for the sake of completeness.

Good Santa Cruz area roads (in no order)
Bonny Doon
Smith Grade
Ice Cream Grade
Upper China Grade (rough surface)
Felton Empire
Jamison Creek (very steep)
Alba (very steep)
Bear Creek (beautiful, but busy connector with no shoulder—be careful)
Summit (trafficky east of Hwy 17 to Soquel-San Jose)
Highland (rough surface)
Eureka Canyon (great sausage shop at Corralitos)
E. Zayante 
Bean Creek
Mountain Charlie (steep, rough)
Branciforte (with Green Valley, nearest to flat in the list)
Mountain View
Laurel Glen
N. Rodeo Gulch
Granite Creek
Glen Canyon
Trout Gulch
School
Soquel-San Jose (very fast, smooth descent)
Brown’s Valley (signed “Brown Valley”)
Green Valley (pleasant farm country)
Madonna
Pine Flat (easier climbing, fast, relatively straight downhill, scenically ordinary for the area, moderate traffic)
Empire Grade (same as Pine Flat)
Hazel Dell

In fact, there are only a few roads to avoid, always because of traffic: Highway 9, Bear Creek Road, Mt. Hernon Rd., maybe Graham Hill Road, and of course Hwy 17.

In 2020 the Santa Cruz area was battered by a horrific fire.  It was centered around Big Basin, and damaged all our rides on the west side.

If you want an good organized introduction to the riding in the area, check out the Santa Cruz Mountains Challenge, a century with routes of various lengths, the longest being a killer 135-mile route with 13K of elevation gain.  It’s in late July.

Monterey is the opposite of Santa Cruz. It has almost no small back roads—just big through-traffic routes, lousy for riding. But it does have four rides I like, and those four I really like. I visit the area once a year, I do these four rides, and I go home.

Monterey is the home of the Sea Otter Festival, the biggest bike festival in the United States and maybe in the world. It’s four days of immersion in everything cycling, it’s in a great venue, it’s essentially free (about $30 for four days), and if you haven’t been you simply must go. It has amateur racing, pro racing, centuries, fun rides, some of the best mountain bike trails in the state, about 400 industry vendors happy to chat with you about their products, swag and discount deals galore, trials demonstrations, kids’ classes, a pump track, the finest bikes in the world for you to demo, and 40,000 riders who share your passion. It’s 80% mountain biking, but that’s OK—there’s more than enough to keep you busy, and you might consider demoing a $10,000 mountain bike while you’re there and seeing what that’s all about.

Lodging around Monterey is all about location. You can spend a fortune for a room in a Pacific Grove B and B overlooking the water, you can pay $150 for a standard motel room just down the road in Marina, or you can do the easy, scenic half-hour drive to Salinas and get a Motel 6 for $90. As far as I know, lodging in Santa Cruz is all pricey. As of 4/16 airbnb is illegal in Monterey but not in Pacific Grove.

There are roads in the Monterey area I’d make an effort to avoid. Hwy 1 most obviously—it’s downright dangerous for bikes from Monterey to Big Sur. The first 12 miles of Carmel Valley Rd. is big and busy and you’ll be on the shoulder the entire time.   Laureles Grade is touted as the area’s plumb climb, but I see nothing good about it—a straight up/straight down hill from a too-busy road to a too-busy road, itself heavily trafficked, littered with glass.

Krebs has a good map covering this area.

Monterey Bay rides:
Bean Creek/Mtn. Charlie/Soquel-San Jose
Big Basin
Bonny Doon/Empire Grade
East Zayante Road
Seventeen-Mile Drive
Robinson Canyon Road
Lone Tree Road
East Carmel Valley Road/Cachagua Road
San Juan Canyon Road
San Juan Grade Road
N. Rodeo Gulch Road
Felton Empire/Empire Grade
Monterey Bike Trail
Shirtail Canyon

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Cycling Southern California

I don’t know a lot about riding in Southern California. So I’m sure my list is missing a lot of good stuff. You locals, please tell me what I’m missing. Much of the riding I’ve done there has been guided by toughascent.com, my inspiration in cycling and blogging. So in several of my ride descriptions I’ll encourage you to consult his more extensive treatment of the ride. And don’t miss LesB’s excellent introduction to the area in the comment section at the end of the Tuna Canyon Loop ride.

If you’re from Northern California (or anywhere other than Southern California), you have a lot of stereotypes to overcome.  Specifically, these aren’t urban rides.  They’re all nearly car-less (at least on weekdays), and many of them are as wild and Out There as anything in Northern California or Oregon.

The further south you go, the less lush the terrain gets.  By the time you’re down to the Mt. Figueroa ride, as soon as you start to climb you’re in what I call mountain desert—waterless, brush-covered hillsides.  For me, this sort of riding is mostly about the road contour and the vistas.

Bestrides has no rides south of LA, because I can’t find anything really good there.  San Diego has its share of bike paths (most famously the Bayshore Bikeway) and some interesting Hwy 1 coastal riding, worth doing if you happen to be there, but I don’t think any of it merits inclusion in Bestrides.  East of San Diego is dry, scrubby desert, not particularly pretty to my eye, and the terrain doesn’t force road builders to create curves, so all the roads I’ve checked out are basically flat, basically straight—not worth going out of your way.  Please let me know if I’ve missed something.

Southern California rides:
Nacimiento-Fergusson Road
Peachy Canyon Road
Santa Rosa Creek Road
Mt. Figueroa
Jalama Road
Gibraltar Road
Tuna Canyon Road Loop
Glendora Ridge Road
Maricopa Highway
Caliente Loop
Parkfield Grade
Tepusquet Road
Santa Rita Road/Cypress Mountain Road
Adelaida Road/Chimney Rock Road
Huasna Road
Prefumo Canyon Road/See Canyon Road
Round Mountain Road
Mission Bay to La Jolla
Cabrillo National Monument

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Cycling the Eastern Sierra

The Eastern Sierra is a world unto itself, neatly cut off from the rest of California by the Sierra range. We’re talking about the Hwy 395 corridor and the spurs that run off the highway east and west. It may well be the most beautiful cycling in California, because every ride has the magnificent east side of the Sierra as a backdrop. On average, it may also be the hardest cycling in California, because most of the rides are steep and high in elevation.

Since for most of us it’s hard to get to, you’re unlikely to drive there to do a single ride. So I’m going to assume you’re going for an extended cycling vacation and want to know what you’re in for. Since Streetview gives you next to no information about the area, I’m going to do some things here that I’ve done nowhere else in Bestrides: I’m going to review every road along 395 that you might imagine riding, from north to south, I’m going to include rides I don’t like, and I’m going to include roads I drove but didn’t ride, so you can make an intelligent choice about which routes suit you best.

Hwy 395 runs north and south through the Owens Valley and other areas, skirting the eastern edge of the Sierra. The eastern side of the Sierra is completely unlike the western side. The west is a gradual, gentle climb through miles of foothills. The east is a precipitous drop, a near-wall of spectacular rock. From the start of the western foothills to the crest is around 50 miles; from the east it’s about 15.

So rides that go west from 395 (as all of our rides in the area do save one, Bristlecone Pine Forest) follow a pattern: they cross the west side of the valley on a few miles of basically flat road, then when they reach the mountains they climb, steeply and continuously—usually at 7-9%—either up a canyon or switchbacking up a rock face. This they do for about 15 miles, then dead-end at a lake, a campground, or a mountain resort.

All the rides along 395 are high. The Owens valley itself is 4000-4500 ft elevation, and the rides climb several thousand feet above that—the highest ride, Rock Creek Road, tops out at 10,225 feet—so the air is thin. Unless you’re adapted to elevation, you’ll be short on oxygen and the climbing will be harder (and slower) than the numbers suggest. A 7% pitch feels like 9%, 9% feels like 13%. You might say to yourself, “No problem—I’ll just go out there two days ahead of time and acclimate.” No you won’t. Acclimation takes a minimum of a week at elevation—for some people, longer—and there’s no way to accelerate the process, so unless you’ve got a week to kill hanging around at 8000 ft elevation, you’re going to have to do these rides on your lowland cardiovascular system.

So most of Bestrides’s area rides are hard—you can expect to work for about 2.5-3.5 hours without a break. I’ve looked for easier rides in the area, and found 4: June Lake Loop, Twin Lakes Rd., South Round Valley Rd., and Tuttle Creek Rd. South Lake Rd. is the easiest of the climbs. The rest are major work.

All our rides, save one (Bristlecone), are on the west side of 395. There are roads on the east side, a fair number of them, but they tend to be dead flat, dead straight, through endless boring fields of desert scrub. It’s a terrain that appeals to some but not to me.

Who wants to ride here? A person who loves to climb. A person who loves big, open vistas—the views of the Owens Valley from any of the climbing rides are stupendous. A person who likes rocks—this area has some of the best rock in the world (see the photos below and in the individual ride descriptions). A person who likes fairly straight, screaming descents—40 mph is nothing on the return of some of these rides. A person who likes dramatic, Bob-Ross-quality mountains as a constant backdrop. And a person who likes small, quaint, unpretentious, outdoorsy towns.

The road surfaces in the area are, in all but one way, pristine—I never saw a pothole, a road patch, or chipseal. The one way they aren’t is expansion cracks, a regional curse. On some of these roads, every five yards or so sees a prominent crack horizontally across your path—usually filled with dribble-tar, sometimes not. Not much of a problem ascending, they turn your descent into a continuous kaTHUMP kaTHUMP kaTHUMP. A given ride either has them or it doesn’t. The rides that I know suffer from this affliction are Onion Valley Rd., Hwy 168W, and the high end of Lower Rock Creek Rd. Needless to say, none of these roads is a recommended ride.

The Eastern Sierra is not uniformly gorgeous. Some stretches are grander than others. The most dramatic peaks are from Big Pine to Lone Pine, and, by some lucky miracle, the four best area rides are there as well: Bristlecone, Tuttle Creek, Whitney Portal, and Horseshoe Meadows.

When to go? The area is hot in summer and snowed in in winter. So you want to go in early summer, when the roads have had time to dry out, or fall before the snows begin. Ideally, you’d like there to be some snow in the highest elevations, because the mountains are prettier then, by a factor of about 5. So I’m thinking June or late September-October. Much depends on how much snow has fallen in the previous winter. In an ideal world, you would wait for the first dusting of snow in the high elevations followed by clearing weather, then jump in your car.

Here is every Eastern Sierra ride I can imagine you thinking about doing, from north to south, their vitals, and what I think of them:

Twin Lakes Road (Bridgeport): it’s a Bestrides ride—see the write-up.

Virginia Lakes Rd. (from Conway Summit, just north of Mono Lake): 12.2 miles RT, 1700 ft gain. A short, generic wooded ride with vertical gain typical of the area, ending in a charming, unspoiled little mountain lake with a classic, funky “resort” you shouldn’t miss. Even though it’s one of the shorter climbs in the area, it still tops out at 9800 ft, because you’re starting at a high point along Hwy 395.

June Lake “Loop”: in Bestrides—see the write-up.

Devil’s Postpile: in Bestrides—see the write-up.

Rock Creek Road (south of Mammoth): 20.6 miles, 3135 ft. gain. One of my least favorite rides in the area. Boringly straight climb, followed by a fast, straight descent marred by expansion cracks. Partially redeemed, for some, by Rock Creek Resort at the turn-around, famous for its pies (but when I was there they were out of pie). Famous for being “the highest paved road in California,” topping out at 10225 ft.

Lower Rock Creek Road (at its north end, near Rock Creek Road): 25.7 miles, 3000 ft gain. Unlike all the other rides in the area, this one parallels Hwy 395, joining it at both ends. Thus you might think it flat, but it isn’t at all. Probably the least interesting ride in the area scenically, it climbs steadily through barren Owens Valley hills, essentially straight, with slightly interesting hills to the west and some moderate views of the valley to the south. The terrain and contour get a bit more interesting toward the northern terminus, but then the expansion cracks set in. Not a favorite of mine. One plus: since it descends almost continuously from north to south, and it intersects Hwy 395 at both ends, you can have a friend drop you at the north end and ride 26 miles of nearly uninterrupted downhill, then have your friend pick you up at the southern end.

Pine Creek Road (at the southern end of Lower Rock Creek Road): 15.4 mile, 2690 ft gain. Another climb up into the Eastern Sierra, this road heads into a canyon surrounded by particularly striking, dramatic mountains and ends at a gate. This one almost made it into the Bestrides list.

South Round Valley Road (at the south end of Lower Rock Creek Rd.): in Bestrides—see the write-up.

Hwy 168 West (out of Bishop): discussed in Bestrides’s South Lake Rd. write-up.

Hwy 168 E and White Mountain Road (east of Big Pine): both in Bestrides as “Bristlecone Pine Forest”—see the write-up.

Glacier Lodge Rd. (West of Big Pine): 20.6 miles, 3810 feet of gain: I know nothing about it except at the end there is Glacier Lodge, which is said by some to be rustic and by others to be run-down.

Onion Valley Road (between Big Pine and Lone Pine): 28.5 Miles, 5890 feet. Officially “the hardest climb in California,” a long and tedious slog up a featureless, desolate hillside on a road surface cursed with expansion cracks. Only for those seeking bragging rights.

Finally, three rides out of Lone Pine:

Tuttle Creek Road: in Bestrides—see the write-up.

Whitney Portal Road: in Bestrides—see the write-up.

Horseshoe Meadows Road: in Bestrides—see the write-up.

Eastern Sierra Rides in Bestrides:
Tuttle Creek Road
Devil’s Postpile
Twin Lakes Road
Horseshoe Meadows Road
Whitney Portal Road
Bristlecone Pine Forest
June Lake “Loop”
South Lake Road
South Round Valley Road

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