Spats
05-16-2004, 09:36 PM
Arty50 and I hit Tamarancho today for the first time. Definitely worth the $5 for the NorCal crew.
Tamarancho is a Boy Scout camp near Fairfax, around which an 8 mile loop of singletrack has been constructed. You are discouraged from parking on the access road: we parked in town as directed, bought our passes at the local bike shop, and headed up the paved road to the trailhead.
This is NOT a good place to learn to mountain bike. The first thing you'll encounter is a bunch of steep singletrack switchbacks getting you up to the main loop, and probably several people bombing down at you.
Once you hit the main loop, you'll discover that Tamarancho isn't very technical: there's only one long rocky section, which I call "Land of 1000 Alien Babyheads", and several weird switchbacks. It's very hardtail-friendly.
However, there are a lot of very narrow or low gaps between trees (don't forget to duck!), and the whole trail system is very narrow. There's almost no room to pass anywhere in Tamarancho without stopping and pulling off the trail, and there are a lot of sections with big exposure -- down steep hillsides into lots of little treetrunks with no soft branches.
You never lose or gain a lot of elevation at once, except in getting there and back. Lots of nice rolling hills that let you crank along in your middle ring, several small bridge crossings, yes, please.
The scenery was beautiful, the trail was well-maintained and kept us alert, and
everything was great until we got to the end of the loop and Arty said "We should go back and try that double teeter we passed at the beginning."
I think you can see what is going to happen here.
We get back there, and after a couple aborted attempts, Arty gets halfway through before falling off the side. No big deal.
Well, I tried it, and fell off in the same place, except for one detail: Arty fell uphill, and I fell downhill. About 6-7 feet straight down, landing flat on my back on some of the hardest dirt I've ever had the displeasure to ingest.
1) Helmets are good.
2) I'm not sure if swearing really helps, but I did a lot of it anyway.
3) Always keep a Vicodin or two in your seatbag.
4) It's really hard to descend singletrack switchbacks when you can't move your lower back.
5) The first feature you try probably shouldn't be an off-camber double teeter about 12" wide on the side of a hill.
Summary: Great ride, skip the teeter.
Tamarancho is a Boy Scout camp near Fairfax, around which an 8 mile loop of singletrack has been constructed. You are discouraged from parking on the access road: we parked in town as directed, bought our passes at the local bike shop, and headed up the paved road to the trailhead.
This is NOT a good place to learn to mountain bike. The first thing you'll encounter is a bunch of steep singletrack switchbacks getting you up to the main loop, and probably several people bombing down at you.
Once you hit the main loop, you'll discover that Tamarancho isn't very technical: there's only one long rocky section, which I call "Land of 1000 Alien Babyheads", and several weird switchbacks. It's very hardtail-friendly.
However, there are a lot of very narrow or low gaps between trees (don't forget to duck!), and the whole trail system is very narrow. There's almost no room to pass anywhere in Tamarancho without stopping and pulling off the trail, and there are a lot of sections with big exposure -- down steep hillsides into lots of little treetrunks with no soft branches.
You never lose or gain a lot of elevation at once, except in getting there and back. Lots of nice rolling hills that let you crank along in your middle ring, several small bridge crossings, yes, please.
The scenery was beautiful, the trail was well-maintained and kept us alert, and
everything was great until we got to the end of the loop and Arty said "We should go back and try that double teeter we passed at the beginning."
I think you can see what is going to happen here.
We get back there, and after a couple aborted attempts, Arty gets halfway through before falling off the side. No big deal.
Well, I tried it, and fell off in the same place, except for one detail: Arty fell uphill, and I fell downhill. About 6-7 feet straight down, landing flat on my back on some of the hardest dirt I've ever had the displeasure to ingest.
1) Helmets are good.
2) I'm not sure if swearing really helps, but I did a lot of it anyway.
3) Always keep a Vicodin or two in your seatbag.
4) It's really hard to descend singletrack switchbacks when you can't move your lower back.
5) The first feature you try probably shouldn't be an off-camber double teeter about 12" wide on the side of a hill.
Summary: Great ride, skip the teeter.