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My Auburn/Downieville Report (really long, pics by TimL) (15 posts)
|  My Auburn/Downieville Report (really long, pics by TimL) | Fast Eddy
Jun 9, 2003 11:04 AM | |
Tim and I met up in Livermore at 8:30 on Thursday. We loaded my stuff into his truck, and the next thing I knew, I was ordering a double-double at 10:30 at In-n-Out in Auburn.
It wasn't the smartest thing to do. I'd have done fine with a burger and some lemonade. I even ate all the frys.
It was pretty hot right out of the car down at the confluence lot, just off 49. We rode up Stagecoach and Upper Stagecoach, and down Mossy Rock. It was hot, and the gutbomb from In-n-Out made me even slower than usual, but the Mossy Rock downhill was good. Then we rode the Lake Clementine Trail to Culvert trail...
...to Confluence trail. A little less hot, and the downhill was even better.
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Some sections of Confluence are awfully close to the edge.
We hit Cambria Bikes on the way outta dodge to get some stuff. The best stuff in the place wasn't for sale, but we got to look. Wow! If FP were there, we'd have a picture. We grabbed some Taco Bell and headed to D'ville.
Around 5 we parked in Downieville, and headed over to Yuba Expeditions. Greg was there wrenching some and drinking beer with Mike, who Tim says was Mike Ferrentino of BikeMag fame, right? I found a picture that I didn't recognize.
We got a 12 pack, and hung out for over an hour. Typical D'ville Thursday at 5pm. Mike's dog was bored to sleep by the conversation. We talked of trails, weather, the gathering, shuttles, business, customers... Greg showed me around their new Taqueria, which was squarely at the end of our Friday ride. We plotted our impending ride with the help of their big maps.
Greg and Tim decided the best place for us to camp was up in the middle of First Divide, down by the river (Yuba).
There, just about dark, we pulled in and met Jamie. He had a small tent, a touring mtb, and a bob trailer. It turns out he was on a long loop from Tuscon to Eureka, and then down the coast to San Diego. Ironic thing is that he knows CJ and MaryEllen! Apparently he stayed at their place in a school bus, or something, a couple years ago. We all had good company, and we stayed up until the beer was gone, despite the mosquitos. Lucky for us the scotch never came out. There would have been even more pain on Friday.
We slept well, so we didn't notice the milk Tim bought for the cereal was buttermilk until after 8. We ate it with water, and headed up first divide around 9. Last time I tried the Downie River side of First Divide, there was a bunch of hike-a-bike, and it was overgrown in some parts. Now it's one of those downhill-in-both-directions trails. And parts of it are nicely rocky. This was the only trail we repeated on our loop. It was sweet.
Third Divide starts climbing right away. It wasn't long before I tested the waters of granny ring. Somewhere along the way, Tim found a GPS in the trail. Tim was trying to talk me into a faster gear each time he waited for me (thanks), but I was having none of that. And there was also a good crop of mosquitos. DEET would have been a good call.
If you're going up for the gathering, I'd bring some. If you were downhilling only, and you didn't stop to wait, rest, fix a flat, or eat, they couldn't catch you. Except for the uphill before the 2nd/3rd junction. I'm bringing some.
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Anyhow, "time flies..." and we were at the lower junction with Big Boulder easier than I had expected. The section of Butcher Ranch Trail just after the Yuba River Bridge has some loose sections, but it was mostly rideable. I grannied some technical baby-head sections that I could just barely make.
Side note: I just got some Mutano Raptors for my gearie. The Lazer casings are just perfect for Downieville. I ran about 30psi. I think I can notice the extra weight though. Good climbing, and good cornering. Thumbs up.
After Butcher starts to flatten out, you come to "The Bus Stop". There's a bus stop sign tacked up to a tree, near a gold mining cabin just after Pauley Creek on the way down. The miner yells out to us, and sure enough, it was his GPS that Tim had found. We talked awhile about his gold mining, mtbers, his GPS. He was pretty stoked to get it back. He told us that the old name for the Downie River was, "the north fork of the north fork".
On this section of Butcher you're surrounded by sights and sounds of the trees and the river. It's a gentle climb of about a mile total, and it's awesome, in the true sense of that word.
On the Pauley Creek bridge, we had a pretty long food stop. I took off my shoes and looked for nuggets. Not very hard though. I don't know how those old miners deal with the cold. It is exactly what you'd call ice water. And I didn't find any gold, dammit. I did have half a salami sandwich.
We had a topo map, and there were sections of the ride that looked pretty brutal. The top of Pauley Creek Trail above the 2nd bridge especially. The lower part, before the bridge was very sweet. It climbs about 400' in a little over a mile, right along the river. There were some motorcycle tracks, and I saw one or two mtb tracks, but it was obvious that it hadn't been ridden much.
The NF of the NF, flowing under the bridge was spectacular. The top section of the trail was steep, and we walked some, but when we got to the top, we were both wondering, "where was the hard part?" Maybe it was just shorter than we expected.
It had taken us about four hours, including stops to get to Gold Valley. We stopped for another food break. It must've taken us almost an hour to get up Pauley Creek Trail, and my camelbak went dry near the top. The bastard leaks around the lid, so I can't fill it up, or I get drips down the crack of my you-know-what. I washed up in the creek. We ate in the path of these 1" black ants that were getting into everything. Either we were lazy, or they weren't too big of a problem, because we didn't move. I inventoried my liquids. 80% of a small bottle of Gatorade, and 75% of a large water bottle. Tim had water though, so there was no emergency.
As I was getting ready to ride, I spied a couple patches of snow nearby. It was the first we'd seen, so I rode over to play. As I rode through, I realized that it was probably drinkable! I brushed off the crap on the top, and sure enough, pure white snow. I stuffed a bunch into my camelback, and topped it off with the water from my bottle. Not only did I have half-a-bladder of water, it was ice-cold water.
The last scary-looking climb on the topo map was a section of Smith Lake OHV trail, leading up to Big Boulder Mine. It was granny-gear, with lots of loose rock, and we'd already been climbing for four hours. Melting snow made most of the rough jeep trail into a shallow creek. Soon enough, there were snow patches invading on the trail. About 6000' we stopped at the first snow patch that completely covered the road.
We could ride less and less as we got higher and higher up to the top at 6500'. Eventually, near the top, we came across a large snow field with a lone doe grazing the bare spots. Tim got within 20 yards of her, and she was barely concerned. It took us 10 minutes to puzzle out where the road went under the snow. Luckily the trees were thick enough so it was even possible to figure it out.
Shortly afterwards, as the ridgeline gained more southern exposure, the snow thinned out. We were soon at the top where you get this nice view of the Sierra Buttes and Packer Saddle to their left.
We told Greg the day before that we'd try to clear as many trees as we could, so on the way down, we started a count. By the time we got down Big Boulder, we'd cleared 17 fallen trees, and made one log ramp. There were three that were too big or too well attached that we just couldn't move.
This was my first time on Big Boulder. The top has a short section of fire road that ends at the Big Boulder Mine.
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After the mine, there's a nasty hike-a-bike section. Even nastier after five hours of climbing. It was short enough, and the pay-off is substantial. Big Boulder trail has views that caused me to stop and say, "Wow!". It was spectacular.
The trail has fast-and-smooth, and rocky, and exposure. Down lower, there are some little rock gardens in the trees. It was as good as everyone says.
At the junction with third divide we stopped for some food, and to get bitten by mosquitos. As we got up, Tim noticed he had a flat. We pushed up to the top of Third divide, about 40 yards, where we fixed it, and got bitten by more mosquitos.
There were no more picture stops or food stops. My snow had melted enough so I had a water supply. Second divide went by in a blissful, but I'm-spent kind of a haze. It's such a sweet trail. The 1st-2nd-3rd-1st loop from town would be sweet! Night ride anyone?
I almost cracked my elbow and my big ring on a rocky switchback on First Divide on the way out. My elbow actually faired better than my new ring, but it's salvagable. Further up First Divide, we ran into Jamie. I was down to my last sips of snow, and he was sporting a 1.5 litre water bottle in a special enduro cage. It was tasty. Thanks for that Jamie.
The top section of First Divide ended with some nice little air off of a jump at Lavezzola Road. We had two options left. There was the lower half of First Divide, and there was one Sierra Nevada in the truck. I was ready for the Sierra, so Tim gave me the keys to the truck and hit the remaining stretch of trail. The beer was sweet, and I found half a bottle of gatorade. I cleaned up in the river, and looked around for nuggets. I rolled up the tent, and gave Jamie my phone number, just in case.
Back in town, we had tasty beef burritos and Modelos from Greg's new taqueria. We ate on the couch in Yuba Expiditions as they discussed how Roger Lackey was cleaning up every week in Prarie City. As we were ready to hit the road, we were offered, and accepted a couple more beers from their cooler. Great place Downieville is.
Finally, as we were loading up the truck, Greg swung by on a new white Heckler from the rental fleet that he had tuned up, and was testing out. Coincidentally, I had just come across the single-malt scotch that we narrowly avoided the night before. Tim declined as the designated driver, but Greg and I each had a sweet pull off the bottle. A fitting toast to an awesome two days of memories. Thanks Tim.
Downieville as a mecca? Seems fitting. See you all there in three weeks. |
| very nice, Ed! | pfunk
Jun 9, 2003 12:10 PM | | We rode henry coe saturday. Thanks for the route info you gave us a few weeks back. We got some really nice photos too. I'll post them later.
Btw - I still have that extra 100oz bladder. I can bring it up to downieville with me, if you like.
Great ride report! Can't wait to get up there! |
| 4 hrs of climbing | pedalAZ
Jun 9, 2003 12:12 PM | | Sounds like our ride yesterday. We did a major climb of about 1,600' (starting at 5,900) in the first 4 miles, then lots of ups and downs for another 5, about 7 miles of downhill, then 3+ road climbing miles up about 600' back to the start. It was hot, too. Leg cramps kicked in for the 3 road miles.
I was on Lava Gel instead of my usual Clif Bars and must not have taken in enough Potassium. I got some bites of a Peanut Butter Clif Bar from PaulB while trying to walk the ramps out, but the banana back at the cabin was what I needed. It was even better than the beer. |
| Great stuff Fast Eddy....good read & pic's....thks...nm | Ebo
Jun 9, 2003 12:15 PM | | |
| Wet the appetite? (nm) | DirkFH
Jun 9, 2003 12:31 PM | | |
| Yep....but that's a long way up to the top....not sure | Ebo
Jun 9, 2003 12:52 PM | | if Chuck would be willing to torture himself to that degree. Two years ago Sharkman and I ran into one of my neighbors climbing up to Big Boulder that same route. Later. |
| Great write up! | Roger---
Jun 9, 2003 12:19 PM | | Sounds like a great weekend! |
| Did you read the part about you? nm | Fast Eddy
Jun 9, 2003 1:05 PM | | |
| I'm guessing Chuck was there? | Roger_
Jun 9, 2003 1:12 PM | | Not sure who else would bring those races up. ;0) I've had some pretty good races out at Prairie City this year. Thanks for the mention, I just hope I don't fall apart before Creampuff! |
| In & Out for Breakfast ? Gotta Try that! Had my first 3X3.... | merlin
Jun 9, 2003 1:25 PM | | after doing the 120 mile version of the Sierra Century on Saturday. Nice little post ride snack. :} |
| Excellent writeup! | Zonic Man
Jun 9, 2003 4:54 PM | | I'm glad you liked those trails...I'd be dissappointed if we didn't hold the gatheringing in a "mecca". LOL.
Good trailwork too. I did the same thing on second and third about 3 weeks ago as well.
I still woulda loved to ride with ya.... |
| I'm truly sorry... | Fast Eddy
Jun 9, 2003 5:09 PM | |
It would've been great to have you along! I figured you just went up there, and you'd be working. Space move; sorry again. |
| Don't be sorry! | Roger___
Jun 10, 2003 7:52 AM | | This is Jed you're talking about! ;0) |
| Nice writeup and pictures.... | Monte
Jun 9, 2003 7:41 PM | | thanks. Wish I could make the gathering.
Monte |
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