 The night was expectedly cold and well below freezing. Morning revealed a coating of thick frost over bikes and shelter. We packed up and enjoyed the well-heated bathrooms before pushing off down the road to enter Cuyamaca Rancho State Park. Janna and I joined some singletrack paralleling the road as the sun hit the peaks warming everything. We turned right on East Mesa Fire Road to begin an ascent next to Descanso Creek towards the Cleveland National Forest. The hillsides were sage and olive green with dense groves of live oak and manzanita sprawling across them all. I felt alive and refreshed being out in the backcountry on a spring day in southern California. The dirt road wrapped and wound under hanging eaves of branches and into open spreads of open chaparral before finally gaining the ridgeline next to Oakzanita Peak. Here, the terrain softened into beautiful doubletrack that sped across the highland. Jeffrey Pines grew singularly on high along the route...(Continue Reading)
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