RCY RIDE REPORT
Ojai & the Gridley Trail
Saturday
03-17-07
 
You've already read Uncle Louie's draft for the script of Ojai, The Musical  (CLICK HERE FOR UNCLE LOUIE'S REPORT).  Now let me present you with a few photos of the set designs.  As SteveW related, eight of us arrived in a fog enshrouded Ojai, leaving one vehicle at the base of Gridley Road and continuing on with 3 other vehicles to the base of Sisar Road where we unloaded our steads to begin our shuttle ride.
 
Uncle Louie (aka Steve) unloads his gear with his new found buddy Frank (aka Fred) behind
 
Soon we were pedaling up the long 9-mile climb of Sisar Fireroad.
 
Rising above the fog, Victor and Fred climb Sisar under beautiful blue skies
 
Steve and Reuben round a curve on Sisar
 
The group poses midway on the Sisar climb
from the left: Steve, Andy, Victor, Bill, Reuben, SteveW, & Fred
 
A panoramic view of the Ojai Valley from Sisar Road with fog still enveloping the coast (scroll to the right to view all)
 
Gridley Trail beckons in the distance (a thin dark line mid-picture is Gridley)
 
 
We finally finished the long climb of Sisar and began the traverse of Nordoff Ridge.  Sweeping turns and rolling short descents and tough climbs greeted us as we headed towards Gridley.  You may recall the huge Day Fire that started last Labor Day.  At one point winds were blowing the fire towards the backside of Ojai and a huge effort was made by firefighters to cut a fire line to protect the city of Ojai.  Much of Nordoff Ridge was bulldozed as part of that fire line and at times it made the pedaling tough through the loose rocky ground that was dozed.
 
The fireroad on Nordoff Ridge was widened last fall by bulldozers during the Day Fire threat
 
Steve rides the last fast downhill section on Nordoff Ridge down to the Gridley Trailhead
 
Just before the descent of Gridley, the group poses:
Standing from left: Reuben, Bill, Fred, Steve, Victor, and Andy
Groveling....er, kneeling: Rob and Steve
 
From this point on was to be the dessert of the ride--the descent of the wonderful Gridley Trail.  Only problem for a few of us, however, was that after almost 17 miles of mostly climbing we were fatigued and it was a little tough to focus on and enjoy the downhill.  But nevertheless it is still one of the best downhill runs in southern California and all arrived at the bottom with big grins.  The 24 mile ride took almost 5 hours (3:50 of actual ride time for me) to complete.  I'm pretty sure we did over 4000 feet of climbing. 
 
Tired and hungry but happy, after shuttling the vehicles back, we headed on over to Antonio's in Ojai for some welcome mexican food, drink, and legend-making over our epic ride.
 
Have a great week.
 
Robco Baggins

 

______________________________________________________________

RCYMountainBiking.com