Repack Report

View east from about 250 yards down Repack.
(Pictures taken around noon on November 21, 2009. I heard the weather on some parts of the country is somewhat less temperate.)

View of the golf course on Bolinas Fairfax Road--again, it's November.





Just a general FYI to those living in fear of what many regard as downhill biking's Banzai Pipeline: Repack, aka Cascade Canyon fire road, was graded a couple of years ago.

As a result, the legendary--and sometimes mythical--abysses, six-foot drops, and ass-shattering crevices have been pretty much smoothed out.




But the overall gravitational scenario remains, so there is plenty of opportunity to fly headlong off a cliff, meld your face with a sturdy tree, juice your brain box on substantial rocks, and just generally eat any combination of rock, mud and dirt--and that's just on your way there, per the pic above of PMS Hill. Word is some people go UP Repack to avoid it.

Pine Ridge just south of where Repack drops off.

Just drops off . . .

Blue Ridge is over there somewhere:

Rolling . . .

Green!

The end: Cascade Canyone Park


For those seeking the quintessential elevator ride down scenario, there are other local hotspots that no one seems to care about. Luiz fire road coming down from Big Rock Ridge is one, and Blue Ridge fire road (which converges with Repack in Cascade Canyon is another.

A pic from Blue Ridge:

The Other Gold Hill

People forget that the Gold Hill Fire road is more than a path up from Dominican to China Camp.

Gold Hill also has another stretch that drops down from Bayhills all the way into Peacock Gap. It's also seriously steeper in some places than the regular Gold Hill is.

If you're up for a challenge, try rolling up the path on the left. I'll leave that to the younger crowd:

Consequently, unless you're a supreme masochist, it's better to start on North San Pedro and come up over the Nike site, then to the even more hellish hill by Bayhills, and then take the elevator all the way down to P-Gap.

The Nike missile site--what it is on Nov. 19, 2009. Hard to believe this weather. A storm is coming, but not until tomorrow.

View east:

View West:

Me or Popeye, not sure which:

The view back down and north from the top of Hell Hill. It's only 200 feet long and paved, but it gets increasingly steep near the end:

There are a lot of antennas up here . . .

. . . .and apparently the top of the ridge is like an outdoor microwave oven:

Views of Gold Hill's backside, south of where the more well known section of Gold Hill comes up from Domincan:

That's the ridge you came south over:






China Camp at dusk:



Giant Trail Rat:

Pine Mountain Loop

Here are some photos from the Pine Mountain Loop above Fairfax.

I was delighted to arrive at the trail head and discover that I left my water bottle at home. With an unknown quantity of water in a Camelback along as a map carrier, I took the plunge.

Not a good place to run out of water.

This is the lead in to the really ugly hill:

The photo, looking down, does not do justice to the incline:

Hills . . . .

Hills . . . .

Hills . . .

Hills . . . .



Really should have brought more water . . .


Not a soul to see . . . .



I hope that's a dog track:



Back down the hill to Bolinas Fairfax Road:

How Not To Go Up Repack

Trying to go up Repack in Cascade Canyon is a bad idea, but my ungrateful progeny's unwillingness to provide car transport to Pine Ridge forced the issue.

I suppose I should have brought a map, so that I would have reduced the likelihood of going up Cascade Canyon . . . 

and taking a right on Blue Ridge Fire Road:

But I've gotten used to things like pushing my bike up a mile and a half of 40% grade consisting of recently washed riverbed, mud, and slippery rock.

Nice views . . . . 

Steep . . . . 

Apparently not well maintained:

Here's what it looks like after you get around the tree:

And the wrong trail:

Son of a . . . . this was like having a nightmare about trying to ride the up a down escalator with 4 foot stairs, only to wake up in Tamarancho.  Without the damned day pass . . . . 

Wagon Wheel--the mere thought of which I detest--seemed like the best way out.

An attempt to shortcut B-17  . . . . 

put me right on the fire road that's off limits to non-Boy Scouts . . . . 

eventually ran into Goldman, thence to Alchemist, and several miles off to where I had parked my car.

God damn it!