Ride Report Hurkey Creek - Idyllwild

It was really great seeing everyone again, and all of the new peeps too! Dillon and I rolled into camp Friday arround 2, set up and just kicked back. We were following the weather and knew it was going to bevery cold. We stocked up on firewood, clocked up a good dinner, did our camp rounds and waited for the rest of our site peeps tho show.
Andy and Annie came about 8 or so, and Matt and Skylar(The Shuttle-Bunny) arrived around 11, after a wrong turn or two.
In the morning, Skylar drove us to the top of Ernie Maxwell and we instruccted her to meet us at camp in a few hours. We got to the bottom of E.Max and Sky was waiting for us!!! Matt is a lucky man! We loaded the bike to hitch a ride up to the top of South Ridge, turned the corner and the effing gate was locked!!!
We all thanked Sky anyways and started the grind. At the top we ran into Simon, Hanzo and there crew. We went down South Ridge, Snakeskin and then over to Missing Link and Tunnel of Love. Then we went back to camp and found Skylar with da'kine grinds! Yummy sandwiches from town!!
After a late lunch, Matt twisted my arm and had Sky shuttle both of us to the top of Tomas Mtn.
Ramona trail was a BLAST!!
Ended up not riding on Sunday. Lounged around and had breakfast with Andy and Annie. We broke camp, they went for a loop and Dillon and I headed home.
What a great way to spend a weekend!!

 

Man, I had a blast yesterday!
I had problems keeping my blood sugar up during a good part of the ride, but finally got it straightened out.

I think one of the best parts of the ride, at least for me, was riding the trail that Liz picked out to be "the trail, the ONE trail"! :lol: It wasn't so fun heading up, but sure was a short blast of FUN going back down! :clap:

I didn't take many pictures, but here are the few that I did.

Our leader Daryl, with Sanjay and another rider in the meadow.


This one is set as my new desktop background!


Sights like this are the reasons I love riding in the mountains!


It was a great day of riding for sure!!

 

A regroup....

Of course this went downhill in conversation as Gabe Zink was there:lol:



I didn't think to stop for pics on the descent on Ernie Maxwell as the ride down has such great flow it would be a sin to stop. So here's a few of the group coming down Southridge.





Lots and lots of smiles!!!





And that's it for my pix. This morning we shuttle Thomas mountain as some of us were still tired from all that climbing yesterday.But we found out it's a lot better to ride up Ramona then to shuttle it. We left half the group at the bottom to climb while the rest of us were shuttled up. We only got a mile in and there was the group we had left at the bottom. True these are some good faster riders but still makes sense to ride up it versus shuttling it. Ramona was a really fun ride today and I was really happy with myself as I'd made some fairly difficult switchbacks. I had cleaned them all with only one dab and I only had a few more to go. I came up on a easy one and I guess I took it for granted and ended up going OTB but no damage just to my ego. Got home early enough to do some stuff and not overly tired. Great weekend with great friends!!!

 

Just a few pics from another great trip. Lots of fun, lots of eats and of course lots of trails.

 

That dog, Maverick is amazing! What a beautiful animal.

 

I brought my turner. Why?

What a great weekend...nice seeing everyone, riding, hanging out, talking story, having beers, brownies, ribs, and god knows what else to eat...everything all together to make for a great weekend. Oh yeah, the riding was ok too.:bang:

I rolled out of fullerton about 11.30, after a rather late thursday night of closing down Roscoes, and then Heroes, with Dino after the thursday fully loop ride. Which I didn't ride, but went to sushi instead. But anyway...Got up and headed out with the afternoon group into the teeth of what looked to be a building storm. Wind, occasional spits of precipitation, temperature fluctuations of 20 degrees when the sun would peek through...perfect riding weather. The ride itself was great - climb, through the meadow, up to southridge, down snakeskin, exfoliator, then off on the rest of the 24 hour course. Came back to huddle around the epic's fire for the next 7 hours or so, since it was seemingly the only beacon of warmth in that cold, cold night. And then I though I would try and sleep in my hammock, which lasted all of about 30 minutes, at which point i curled up in the back seat of my rav4. My very small rav4.

Which of course meant, by saturday morning it wasn't my head that was hurting, but rather my back and legs! Andy somehow was able to motivate somewhere around 50 riders (!) to get rolling by 9:45...which was a sight to see once we made the first regroup. By the time we climbed out of the meadow, the executive decision was made that the goaters were to be cut free into their own A group, and off we went. Up, up, up, into the lumber piles along southridge fire road, and then down into idyllwild, and up onto Ernie Maxwell. The climb was great, hikers all seemed courteous and friendly, and Donny and I got to throw snowballs at the few riders still coming up once we made the parking lot. Descending was a hoot, though we should have left about 5 minutes later and would have missed the remainder of the group coming up EM. Thanks to martin for making me ride that root roller, which ended up being a whole lot better than i thought it would be! Of course, the looming beast of Southridge was ahead of us. I wish i could say i cleaned it on the ss. Nope, not even close. Maybe next year - guess i've got a project now. Coming down southridge was epic, at least until liz sent us off on "THE trail", as in the best trail ever. Right. Maybe for descending, but for climbing...well, it was still fun, just not quite how she made it sound. All the descending was great back to camp, and the world's best trail dog - Maverick - hung with us the whole time.

Saturday night was warmer, which wasn't hard since friday felt about -2. I managed to eat nearly everyone else's food, from rut, john, and martin's turkey burgers to randy's (1080P) banana bread to chris's (tradersancho) ribs and really good homemade slaw to Nan's amazing brownies. Thanks everybody! Great time hanging out by the fire, this time without the imminent threat of frostbite, and plenty of Ten Fidy imperial stout to work as antifreeze. :drunk:And this time I was halfway smart, and slept in a tent.

The tent turned out to be a really good idea, since at some point in the night the wind came in like a freight train. The wind was still howling in the morning, and it took very little discussion with OMR about just how windy it probably would be up on Thomas mountian to dissuade me from that ride and decide to stay local. Gene, Greg, Art and myself rolled out and hit the usual first climbs, then split off left along a singletrack that just seemed to keep climbing, and eventually dropped up at the fire road. Seemed like Liz's trail from saturday - lot's of climbing, and a short fire road descent; in other words, a great trail to do in the opposite direction! At the bottom of exfoliator Gene and I split left and hit the rest of the 24 hour course, which is such a fun trail it's hard to believe there aren't more trips up here. Hung out with Gene and OMR back at camp, Andy and Ann showed up for a bit, Darryl and greg came by before rolling out, and then we all eventually headed out, leaving Gene up there alone for tonight. Which means he'll probably go ride 5 night laps or something.:lol:

Thanks everyone for taking pics - I never stop to, and appreciate that ya'll do.:beer:

I am so glad I brought the ss for this trip. I almost didn't, but ended up riding all the trails with it, and loved it. Glad you liked it too David...I wasn't the only one with a forlorn looking fs bike locked to a tree!

:beer:

 

even more pics!

finishing up the first climb, with even more riders...















we climbed even more after some sweet singletrack and regrouped again...



The group more or less spread out quite a bit but got a bit bigger on Ernie Maxwell....

OMR


Calepic


Art and Gene



Jay and Gabe


PainFreak and Dirtvert


Ernie Maxwell was a great trail to climb and had some technical areas and a bunch of hikers...a couple regroups later and Scott aka Stjunkie lead off...


















More later of the descent and part of the A group descending...

 

What a wonderful weekend! My legs are good and tired, I'm a little sunburned with chapped lips and lots of smiles. It sure was cold Friday we did an afternoon ride that included Snakeskin and ?other trails - that wind bit right thru ya! I was freezing up until the time the campfires came out - then I got warm but it might have been the beer, or possibly from all the laughing. We slept nice and warm but there was ice in the waterbag when I got up to boil water for coffee Sat am! Met dirtvert as our neighbor (and thanks for the cookies).The day warmed up nicely though and what a ride. Just trying to follow Al and thus took few pictures as all my energy was in chasing the group all day, including Maverick the dog and his boy John. Best dog ever. Ernie Maxwell out and back was a treat. I met Jenny, Donny's sister, who picked some mighty nice lines for me to follow. I managed to have a small stupid crash but the worst part was it was in front of Rut AND in front of hikers to boot. I hate it when that happens!

Ridgeline was a treat, and so much fun, and snakeskin also was good the second time. I even enjoyed THE Liz trail, even more so in the down direction. And then a few of us finished off the 24 hour course.

Sat night was clear and cold but good people, good fires. Thanks to Burner who made like 6 million s'mores for everyone. That wind in the early morning was something. You could hear a gust coming from far away but the sound of the tress, and track it progress and then WHOOSH it would be slamming your tent. Wild! This morning was the coldest I had been all weekend, that wind just bit into me. After whining a bit, Al and I decided to meet burner and stjunkie and climb ramona trail. It was pretty awesome! Tough, but good. The strong guys were able to clean a lot more of the techy uphills than I but still it was a nice hour or so of climbing. Then we ran in to the shuttlers and down we went. Man those guys and gals are fast. Thanks everyone, it was a fun weekend.

 

The STR Hurkey Creek camp-out was a blast. I arrived at 11am Friday to an empty campground, and as people began to arrive, the fun began. A number of us headed out for a ride Friday afternoon. With the cloudy skies, the temperatures were definitely on the low side. This was my first time riding in the Hurkey Cr. area, and i was impressed. Photos just don't do it justice.

At the end of the ride, Craig noticed that I was missing a pivot bolt. Apparently it had been missing all day... even while hitting a small rock drop in the campsite numerous times. #-o Gabe Zink ('our hero') came to the rescue by giving me a ride to Idyllwild, where we convinced the closed hardware store to re-open and miraculously found a bolt that fit perfectly!

Friday night it got down into the upper 20s (with wind).
The rides Saturday and Sunday have been reported by others. Some memorable moments (not all of them fun):
Gabe and the "world's most distasteful joke", Dell and Gene giving-up classic sig quotes (i'm not tellin'), Craig collecting 'photographic evidence', Geronimo's 'drunk injun' trail nap (see photo), Painfreak's crash :-s, Doug getting nailed by someone descending Ernie Maxwell :-s,
hating life climbing/HABing South Ridge then loving life again descending it , railing Exfoliator, non-stop laughter.

Yes, it was an excellent weekend of fun and riding!

 

Here's a couple more scenic shots. Once again, photos just don't do it justice. Hurkey Creek (second pic) is around 4500ft; the San Jacinto Mts. (first pic) are over 10,000ft.

 

We headed out saturday morning, and after taking a wrong turn on the Ramona Expressway and ending up at the 10 fwy, we arrived at the campsite at 10 am. My brother and sister-in law who are new riders, met us there. After setting up camp, and getting a late start, we shuttled up to Ernie Maxwell at 12:30. At the trailhead, we ran into the "A" group getting ready to head back down. As we got ready to head out 5 minutes later, the "B" group arrived. With some newbies and my kid riding shotgun, I expected the going to be slower than the STR groups. Ernie starts out rocky, but I assured the riders that it gets easier. Halfway down, the "B" group passes us and we met up with them at the bottom of the southridge climb.
And that's the last I saw of them. That hill felt steeper than ever. My inlaws were newbies, but they left me behind in the dust.
Going down was much more difficult for the beginners being so loose and having to walk the rockgardens. Snakeskin was much more fun for them and missing link offered spectacular views. Rage in the sage and Tunnel of love was fun as we rolled over all the rock boosters or "bump bump" as my kid calls them. I do miss hitting those trails at speed, but still had a great time. It was only 12 miles but felt longer with the great variety of terrain.
We rolled back into camp at 5:30 just in time to start a fire and throw the pork ribs on the grill. The night was cold as last year, but we slept well and woke up to some howling wind.
But once the sun rose, it warmed up considerably into a hot day. The wind, however didn't let up. I was hoping to shuttle Ramona, since I heard the trail was too difficult to ride with Aiden. That way I could return to camp and allow my inlaws and wife to ride. Instead we rode a portion of the 24 hour course.
The initial climb was much easier this year without a trailer and when we reached the meadow, we stopped to have lunch with Taqhitz Peak in the background. When we reached exfoliator, I decided to go first instead of sweeping. Unfortunately my wife didn't see us turn off and continued down the fire road. When she finally turned around and rode back up, she was pissed. My first time down exfoliator was a blast, nailing the berms with Aiden hootin and hollering the whole way. After that we headed back to camp for the drive home.

Thanks to Ray M for the offer to watch my dog although the scheduling didn't work out. And to Craig's wife(sorry I forgot your name) for saving him from getting eaten and watching him on Saturday.

"B" group preparing for the climb.


Group shot at a rock off the Southridge trail


Yeah, I think I can climb that


Squeezing under a fallen tree tree on snakeskin


Hannah at the water crossing befor missing link.


My brother-in-law Vi


Sister-in-law Lynn


Down off missing link






Bottom of exfoliator

 

Man your son is getting big Steve. Almost time for that specialized.

 

The training wheels on the pushbike need to come off first. Maybe in a year, he'll be ready for the 16"er.


Here's Aiden sessioning and stacking the hill at the restrooms.


After getting some bike handling advice from Donny..............


He gets right back on and cleans the hill:bang:
[youtube]CKslDcN-IWY[/youtube]

I think the fire needs stoking.


Where do you want these?

 

Lil' Epic was going big on the pogo stick

 

not to play the "i can top that" game, but...i can top that.

i drove up sat. morning. the ride started later and went longer than expected. i had to meet somebody in town for dinner, so i didn't have to time to throw my tent up before i left. and when i got back to camp at 11:30, it was too cold/late to deal with it, so i had to sleep in the back of my hyundai elantra.

what i would have given to have a cavernous rav4 to sprawl out in. :lol: but i actually found a few positions that worked (sig. ?) and got some decent sleep. all part of the adventure.

"maverick- you can be my wingman anytime."

 

This is the stuff that dreams are made of.....

I drove...I ate...I froze around a campfire...I slept (somewhat)...I ate more poptarts...I rode & rode and rode... I smiled a lot .... I laughed a lot... I listened to grown men moan... I listened to howls of joy... I saw beautiful landscapes and trails that seemed to go forever either up or down... I saw "this is THE trail"...I saved grown men from falling into the firepit with my body...I sat around the campfire and listened to a lot of signature material... I ate & drank at everyones campsite .... I got up the next day and did it all over again ... I finally sat in the sun like a lizard with Gene and Timmy and stuffed my face with peanut butter and jam sandwiches... then I left... with a lot of memories that makes hanging out and riding with these people a special part of my life.

Thanks guys & girls, it was a total blast.

Oh, and BTW... Rut, you are SO full of BS

 

I went up for the day on Sunday with a couple friends. When rolling thru camp, we noticed that not many people were looking to go ride. Which is now explained by the long ride you guys all did on Sat.

Anyway, we had the trails to ourselves. 3hrs of riding and didn't see a single person.

The ride was a mechanical disaster on my part. I broke my SS chain 4 different times, with no spare chain to be had in the wilderness. I ended up getting pissed and threw it into a tree at the end of "rage in the sage". Coasted the downhill on tunnel and hung onto a seat post on the pavement. Made it through with ruffled feathers.

I need another ride there soon just to redeem myself respect as a mechanic.

 

My usual disclaimer: Sorry sorry if I spoke to you a million times and still don’t remember your name!
Sorry if you said Hi Liz and I said Hi..um..and just waved and turned away!
Please correct me if I post your name wrong.
Nick name: Colander Head!

THANK YOU JONATHON_SYKES81 for getting the ball rolling on this. I had sooooo much fun!!


So yeah! Most excellent and fun!!! I got there Friday late afternoon and was able to get in a 7 mile ride with Todd, Darryl and Greg.
That would be Epicriderat, Jonathon Sykes81 and Luna.
I don’t remember the trail names either but we headed out the usual route, through the meadow, up a hill, down a hill and down another trail.
The boys rolled this Humongous boulder on the left side of the trail. Someone put a log and a rock to help the roll off but it was still very intimidating.
I tried a couple times but stalled at the edge. Then I just sucked it up and went and as the guys screamed”PEDALPEDAL” I went off and cleaned it.
Stopped just before taking Luna out by the bushes and made a quick right back onto the trail!! SWEEEET!!
Thank guys! I wouldn’t have made it without your encouragement! Man!! I sure was shaking though!

Major thanks to Dusty for letting me park in her site and for still liking me even after I forgot to bring her on the ride! I’m sowwy.
I hope crawling on the rocks and sticks begging forgiveness and making my knees bleed was worth it. OMR looking at me like..”WTF is she doing??”

Thank you SheClimbs for the great chili and spinach salad!!
Hope the $$ helps cover the cost and let me know if you want more!!!
The fires were great and there were a number of group fires going where you could visit your favorite STR pals!


Thank you And Rut for the funny stories about Anka, the great facial expressions and hugging me and yelling BAN HER FOR LIFE because of my avatar!
I laughed so much on this trip!!

Saturday, 27 of us headed out after a delicious breakfast by SailCalifornia!! Thank you so much!! The pancakes were incredible!

At the top of the first climb we split into groups and I took off with the A club. It was a nicely paced group and our fitness levels were all pretty much the same.
Unbelievable how beautiful the day was!! After the cold and cloudiness of the night before!
I froze on Friday night in two sleeping bags plus one over me (so that’s 3) and a ton of clothes.
Thank you Steppie for telling me to take off my clothes and sleep naked!It really did help!

So anyway, somehow I became the one that new the way. Did I give that impression? We were at a junction on a dirt road. Go straight on some track that some of the guys did the day before or go up this eensy beensy little rise off to our left that went into the manzanita. It had lots of bike tracks on it. “I’m sure that’s the way! I’m sure that’s IT! That is THE ONE!!
That’s the trail for sure! The one.”
How do you know, LIZ? (note name at end of sentence)
“Because I can tell because it is so buff and has lots of tracks on it and I think it’s the one I did last year! It’s the ONE!” So I then turned and looked at the guy next to me and cupped my hand so no one could see me mouth these words to him; “ I don’t know what I’m talking about.” I observed his jaw hit the ground.
Then with about 17 people looking at me, I turned and rode UP the little trail! I was hearing strange bleating sounds behind me as I climbed. Baaa..baaa beeaa baaa the sounds went on for awhile and then ended. As did the trail at a fire road some time later.
I am seriously racked with guilt that the trail ended. Andy loved it as did a few others and I was trying to accentuate the positive by saying “What a great down hill this will be!!”
Heather gave me serious stink eye and mouthed bad words at me and grumbled evil things and turned around at went down!
Apparently it was a great down hill but I went off on some fork and completely missed it as did the poor slobs, I mean people, that once again moronically followed me (baaa baa).
I wanted to turn around to find where I missed the fork and a couple people were going to follow me (yet again) but all of a sudden a very deep voice boomed "GET DOWN HERE G DAMNITT!!” I don’t know who that was but Hmph! What nerve!!
We ended once again on some road but it was just a hop, skip and a jump back to the folks who were able to do the fun downhill.
I was redeemed in Heathers eyes because it was, apparently, a fantastic downhill. Although I would not know!!

I later saw the tandem couple, Kelly and Mr. Pepper/Bacon man and they told me Dean and his B club flock were about 10 minutes away so I waited for them.
The tandem couple had taken a bad fall on Ernie Maxwell and I think Dean witnessed it. Those two are so nice and very hardcore for sure!!

We also saw Hanzo and JoeTruth at the base of Ernie Maxwell and it was good to see them. Hi Noel!! Cute as ever!
Anyway, the day ended with Gene, myself DavidB and 1080p and Pain Freak and another guy finishing the 24 hour course and ripping the down hill and zipping back to camp.
I had 28 miles and 4000 feet of climbing or so!
Highlights were Maverick the excellent trail dog running downhill in front of me causing me to have an ear to ear grin as he kicked sand in my face!

The camp sites that night were a huge laugh fest! Hi Tim! TIM!
Impy was hysterical at one point. Must be the ‘pudding’ she ate!!!
Mtnbike4fun sat at the fire with sunglasses on, very stone faced while I gyrated and danced for him and crossed my eyes at him and did many other strange things and he never acknowledged so he was either asleep or totally bonked and drunk or I’m not nearly as hot when I gyrate as I thought. And by the way, your new user name is Mr. Socks!!

The next day I shuttled Ramona. Mostly because of the wind and I was tired but I was really really guilty about it. And ultimately I do shuttle sometimes and I don’t care what you think. Please don’t be mad at me!
When Dell(Ladd Jasper) Mike (Pain Freak) Lynn(Sheclimbs) and I got to the top of the trail head, Dean took the vehicle and went off exploring and we suited up and took off down the Ramona trail. 1.68 miles into the trail down Stjunkie came around the corner along with Aosty, Impy and Burner. Burner telling me over and over that it was a great trail to ride up so I guess I’ll do that next time!
Obviously you can ride up it as fast as you can shuttle. Well yes, I know that means only some of us!
The down hill was incredible. Bragging rights are I did not dab ONE foot or do one hand dab the entire trail until the easiest little rubber water bar at the end knocked me off kilter as I went around it. It’s like scaling Mt. Everest and then falling off a curb. DUH!!

Dell! Thank you for the hot dog before bed! It really hit the spot!
Tim! My throat hurts!! Why??
Kelly and Mr. Pepper/Bacon man! Thanks so much! That food was soooooo good!!
And Margo! What can I say! You are simply beautiful with a heart the size of Kaiser’s growth on his leg!
Anyone else I didn’t mention. Sorry. It was just a great time all around and so many of you made me laugh and smile. I really needed that!
I can’t wait till next year!!

 

A few more shots. Sorry no text above them. I'm a lazy poop today!:wave:

TIM!

 

Had a great time out there meeting new people and saying hi to old friends. Did not get my camera out even once so no pictures from me expect my awesome new avatar.

Jeff