A bad day biking is better than a good day working
And after working for 11 months without a day of vacation, I took most of this week off. While Rosh Hashana took up several of my precious vacation days, I was able to do a little early fall mountain biking in the local area this morning. I had previously done a lot of riding up Mount Diablo (as can be seen in other pictures here) but hadn't seen much of the other mountain biking areas in the Danville/Livermore area.
Based on some reviews I saw at MTBReview, I decided to check out the Morgan Territory area. The reviews say that Morgan Territory is an easy ride and all fire trail. That's fairly accurate, but it's not as easy as the reviews make it seem. There are no long, nasty climbs, but there is a decent amount of elevation change and the trails are pretty rutted. That's not to say it was a bad ride, because it wasn't. It was a great ride, just what I was hoping for. Compared to Mount Diablo, which is a straight up, several thousand foot climb, Morgan Territory is indeed easy. The views are outstanding and there wasn't another person on the trails when I was there.
I won't go on about my thoughts on the ride (it was about seven miles and took about an hour) and, instead, will let the pictures speak for the area. It's very remote (when the reviews say that it's a steep, single lane road to get to the staging area, they're not kidding-it really is a one lane road and you have to pull over to let other cars get by) and very beautiful. I took the Volvon and Blue Oak Trail and there were a lot of others that spur off of those that I'll explore later. The warnings about the cows are not to be ignored...this is an open grazing area and the cows really do wander into the trails. Because it's calving season, I had a near miss with one cow and her calf. I hopped off my bike when I got close to them to get a picture and, to my surprise, the mother cow charged me. It may sound funny but when 1,000+ lbs of uncut hamburger comes running at you, you start to realize that size matters.
(Note: the dog pictures at the end of these pictures are not from the bike ride. The light colored chocolate lab was an early morning, uninvited visitor to the house.)
Morgan Territory
Based on some reviews I saw at MTBReview, I decided to check out the Morgan Territory area. The reviews say that Morgan Territory is an easy ride and all fire trail. That's fairly accurate, but it's not as easy as the reviews make it seem. There are no long, nasty climbs, but there is a decent amount of elevation change and the trails are pretty rutted. That's not to say it was a bad ride, because it wasn't. It was a great ride, just what I was hoping for. Compared to Mount Diablo, which is a straight up, several thousand foot climb, Morgan Territory is indeed easy. The views are outstanding and there wasn't another person on the trails when I was there.
I won't go on about my thoughts on the ride (it was about seven miles and took about an hour) and, instead, will let the pictures speak for the area. It's very remote (when the reviews say that it's a steep, single lane road to get to the staging area, they're not kidding-it really is a one lane road and you have to pull over to let other cars get by) and very beautiful. I took the Volvon and Blue Oak Trail and there were a lot of others that spur off of those that I'll explore later. The warnings about the cows are not to be ignored...this is an open grazing area and the cows really do wander into the trails. Because it's calving season, I had a near miss with one cow and her calf. I hopped off my bike when I got close to them to get a picture and, to my surprise, the mother cow charged me. It may sound funny but when 1,000+ lbs of uncut hamburger comes running at you, you start to realize that size matters.
(Note: the dog pictures at the end of these pictures are not from the bike ride. The light colored chocolate lab was an early morning, uninvited visitor to the house.)
Morgan Territory
posted by ZHID at 11:59 AM
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