strawerry peak

[Tom the Bomb]

This Sunday another epic ride from Tom the Bomb
Meet down in the Switzers camp ground at 8:30 am. off of highway 2 traveling through La Cresenta.
We will climb out of the campground to hwy 2 to Angeles forest hwy go rt to the fireroad up to Josephine saddle then strawberry peak trail to hwy 2,across hwy 2 to gabrieleno trl ( red box) and down to switzers. We may try to work the studervant trail in there sumhow. From 16 to 20 miles. Intermediate to advanced riders.
For car pooling in the Rancho cuc or Ontario area call me at 909-921-7924.

 

[Epic_Mtn_Biker]

I'm in, I've been wanting to do Strawberry Peak for a few years now. :clap:

**** OC STR members:
I've heard a lot of great things about this ride from many bikers. This would definitely be a ride worth carpooling for from the OC. Hope to see some of you guys out there!! :wave:

**** Be advised, it may be a bit cool due to the altitude

 

[ShinKen]

I'm in, I've been wanting to do Strawberry Peak for a few years now. :clap:

**** OC STR members:
I've heard a lot of great things about this ride from many bikers. This would definitely be a ride worth carpooling for from the OC. Hope to see some of you guys out there!! :wave:

**** Be advised, it may be a bit cool due to the altitude

a bit cool? NOT!!! more like freaking COLD as HELL!! make sure to be rdy for somm strong winds and COLD weather ](*,)

 

[LBmtb]

Here's Jose's google earth file for strawberry peak.

 

[Tom the Bomb]

The weather is warming up the top of wilson will be close to 60 degrees.
No wind in the forcast.
Ya baby!!!!!

 

[Tom the Bomb]

Jose I could not open this file. What program is it in.
Tom

 

[ShinKen]

Jose I could not open this file. What program is it in.
Tom

:read:
Sorry for taking a while but been busy @ work. That file is for Google Earth!! Great Program that has tons of information and graphics to find your way around this planet!! That file has the whole run between the StrawberryPeak and Sturtevant Trails!! All I know for sure is that after Strawberry Peak we climbed like 6 miles up this paved road to meet the trail head for Sturtevant. #-o I wish I could tell you more about it but it's hard to share any info when you're not familiar w/the trail!! Wish my friend Robert could help or guide you guys on the ride but he has plans this weekend like my self. I'm sorry for not making it this time but for sure next ride I would love to tag along...[-o<
have fun and pls take lots of pics :bang:

 

[outlaw]

Switzers camp ground :?:, Will try to make it, but could use better
directions to exactly where you will be meeting, Ill be heading that way
from the 5 Fwy in OC.

appreciate the help, Mark

 

[Epic_Mtn_Biker]

Outlaw,

here are a few helpful links about the trail and directions a bit lower if you scroll down:

1. Strawberry Peak Trail - Angeles National Forest - Bike Site - Mountain Bike Trails, Bicycle Information for - Bike Shops in -... :clap:

2. Mountain Biking Josephine Strawberry, Southern California :clap:

your best option, judging from looking at the map.

I-5 North
CA-Hwy 2 North
I-210 East (~1.5 miles)
Angeles Crest Hwy (CA2) North to the rendezvous point

The other options of going up the 57 or the 605 to the 210 make you go east and out fo our way more than taking a straight diagonal shot north up to the 2 then straight north to angeles crest hwy. you'll be going thru East L.A. but at that time there is no traffic.

Hopefully you can carpool with others from OC. :wave:

[FONT=Tahoma, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, Sans-Serif] A Forest Adventure Pass [/FONT][FONT=Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, Sans-Serif]is required to park in the lot or anywhere in the entire area.

From Interstate 210 in La Canada, take Highway 2 (Angeles Crest Hwy.) north and drive 10 miles to Switzer picnic area on the right. [/FONT]

 

[hecandsonbikers]

Strawberry oeak

Muchchos,
It is I Hector (Mr. Mcdonalds for breakfeast) I will try to make this ride. I've been going out with this hot chick, so if I can pry my self out of bed from her I'll be there.

See ya
Hec

 

[Tom the Bomb]

Hec if shes that good you might as well bring her with ya.

 

[Tom the Bomb]

Mark armondos directions at the bottom of his post are spot on, turn right and drive down into the camp ground and park there.
See ya there .

 

[Tom the Bomb]

ok Jose you will have to get back to me on this one.
I could probably figure out how to get to sturdevant but I don't know how you got back to Switzers.

 

[ShinKen]

Hec if shes that good you might as well bring her with ya.

Have you tried Google Earth yet? I'm not going to go into all the details about what it does and how cool it is. Please -- do yourself a favor and download and install it. It's awesome and It's free and if u find the link from Strawberry Peak to Sturtevant then u all can meet up @ the end of Sturtevant and Shuttle to the beginning of Strawberry Peak. I think it's the easiest way to do this ride and people will not get lost

 

[Tom the Bomb]

No not yet

 

[Epic_Mtn_Biker]

I'll be carpooling with DTew, from Pomona where the 60 & 71 meet. see you guys up there tomorrow :bang:

 

[outlaw]

Work van took a crap on me today, will have to bow out of this ride to research a replacment, "Seeing as that's how I make a living":-({|=

Anyway, hope to see all you guys on the next one, Mark

 

[gurp13]

Have you tried Google Earth yet? I'm not going to go into all the details about what it does and how cool it is. Please -- do yourself a favor and download and install it. It's awesome and It's free and if u find the link from Strawberry Peak to Sturtevant then u all can meet up @ the end of Sturtevant and Shuttle to the beginning of Strawberry Peak. I think it's the easiest way to do this ride and people will not get lost

I second what Jose said. I d'led the software and opened his file. It's pretty f'in cool. Good call, Jose.

For me, for now, this is as close I'll get to seeing Strawberry Peak. I'm too much of a n00b for this ride. I'll be doing Marshall Canyon instead, I think.

 

[DtEW]

At the risk of sounding like a cheerleader, this was an awesome ride that every intermediate-and-above rider should try at least once. Seriously.

I kept telling Armando that this is what I would call a perfect ride because:

1) Not too much nor too little mileage/ascent. I wouldn't call this ride an epic, but that means it's something you can do week after week (or even semiweekly) without burning out. Man does not live by epics alone.

(I was loving the Noble Canyon epic, but near the end it was like, "wow, fun overdose". Meaning I was tired and mistake-prone, which led to a crash which put me off the saddle for half a month, in combination with other things.)

2) Interesting. Not a moment of boredom with a mix of buffed-soil climbing/rolling/cruising, rocky high-speed descending, interspersed with various thematically-different slow-speed technical sections. Some tricky blind corners too.

3) Scenic. Okay, the weather helped with this one. But it is a truly nice-looking trail and environs.

Seriously seriously fun.

Considering that my GPS powered down (unbeknownst to me) for a short period during the Redbox-to-Switzer segment, here are the stats for this ride:

Mileage: 15 miles (assuredly short of reality)
Total ascent: 3039 feet
Maximum elevation: 5260 feet
Maximum speed: 26.2 MPH
Moving average speed: 5.7 MPH
Moving time: 2 hours 38 minutes (assuredly short or reality)
Stopped time: 1 hour 35 minutes


FYI, a comparable ride is the one up to Inspiration Point and down Sam Merrill/Mt. Lowe/Echo Mt./Skyline trails. That is a bit shorter and a little slower (unless you're completely suicidal) on the descent, with less intensity in its technical challenges, but more drawn-out. The well-marked historical ruins is on-par with the scenic qualities of today's ride. I've done that trail, so I can actually guide that ride. (Armando? Mike? Tom?)

 

[Epic_Mtn_Biker]

What can i say? This ride ended up being a lot more fun than expected and a lot less dangerous than what was mentioned on singletrackmind.com. :clap: Tom C, Mike, Carlos, Dtew & myself made up the group for today's ride and we even bumped into Pain Freak and his 2 friends up on the loop.

For those in the OC, I would have to say that this ride resembles the finer points of Joplin, STT and San Juan; except that the distance of fun is a lot longer. An intermediate rider feeling strong can pretty much do most of the climbing in the middle ring. The descents were: fast, technical, rollercoaster-like, and exposed. the exposure was not too bad, the containment walls allowed for 6-18 or more inches of consistent singletrack. The ride is 99.99% rideable, couple of logs/trees in the way, but nothing major. :lol:

Now that I've done the ride, I definitely recommend an organized carpool for coming all the way up here.

Here's an idea to pitch for everyone: Since the loop starts & ends at the Switzer Picnic Grounds, how about we have a BBQ/picnic there after the ride? hopefully we can get up there before it gets cold or snowed in.

I'd like to hear your guys' opinion on such an idea of riding then picnicing/BBQing. :beer: