When Jim and I landed in Santa Barbara we dialed ourselves in at Motel 6 then mosied downtown to buy a trail map. The whole shopping scene was very shi-shi…with rich, beautiful women everywhere and a bakery for dogs.

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When you think of the greatest places to ride in California, southern Orange County usually doesn’t come to mind. I mean you’ve got your Downieville, your Lake Tahoe, your Mammoth and your, uh, San Juan Capistrano? Unless you’re a swallow, that just ain’t the place to visit.

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I found Day 4’s route in the trail reviews section of www.mtbr.com. There are almost 6,000 reviews in there, a few of which are actually literate. From what I could tell, we were in store for nine miles of pure single track, with a drop of 2,000 feet through a variety of terrain.

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After hitting Mr. Toad’s in South Lake Tahoe, my buddy Jim Norman and I headed south toward Mammoth. The weather was perfect and since it was the week after Labor Day, the roads were empty. We cruised The Panzer along the eastern Sierra on Highway 395, past countless mountains and valleys, and made an excellent side trip up to Sonora Pass, down which I rode my bike.

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My buddy Jim Norman and I recently took the DH and XC bikes on an adventure around California. After enjoying some sweet single track on Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride in South Lake Tahoe, we headed south toward Mammoth. This was the week after Labor Day, and there was zero traffic. The sky was perfectly clear, and the mountains were awesome. On a whim, we decided to hang a right on Highway 108 and check out Sonora Pass, a Sierra crossing near Yosemite.

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In the middle of September my buddy Jim Norman and I rode our own little Tour de California. In the past we’ve driven from the Bay Area to Crested Butte, Colorado for a week of riding. The Rockies are huge, but so is the drive out there. This year we decided to stay a bit more local. As they say, “Think globally, ride locally.” (more…)