What to do on my birthday - ~350 miles of California

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raitchison

Well-known member
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Jul 5, 2011
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Location
West Hills, CA
So Saturday was my birthday and my wife was already committed to attend a training program all day so I decided to go on a nice long (for me) ride.

Got a late start because I slept in and then had a nice unhealthy breakfast ;)

First stop was a quick trip to the Rock Store and the Snake, a bit of riding on Mullholland Hwy is never bad but mostly I wanted to keep up my Foursquare Mayorship of The Snake.

Ride up the 23 all the way into Fillmore, CA, then hop onto Hwy 126 towards Santa Paula.

Grab Hwy 150 into Ojai and get onto Hwy 33.

Now up until this point these are all somewhat familiar roads for me, I've ridden as far as Ojai but that's been the end point of my rides in this area. This time I'm going where I've not gone before.

Just outside of Ojai I noticed that the stretch of Hwy 33 was sponsored by the local ABATE chapter, I don't have much of an opinion on ABATE but I figured if a riders organization is sponsoring the road it probably won't completely suck :)

Hwy 33 was fantastic! Lots of nice quiet canyon & mountain roadway, very light traffic and not even the sight of a police officer. It was a bit chillier than I expected, I should have brought a light jacket to wear under my motoport suit.

Towards the end of the 33 there were some LONG straight stretches of roads, though in theory those stretches of road wouldn't seem quite so long at 135MPH.

At the end of Hwy 33 (now I've ridden every inch of it - though not all at once (yet)) I got to the 166, I could take it to the right which would get me to I-5 and would be the fastest route home, I decide to turn left and head towards the coast.

Stop over for a late lunch in one of those really small towns, based on the exterior of "Burger Barn" you know it's going to be great or terrible (it's great).

I did run low on fuel a bit sooner than I expected (I have no idea how since I certainly wasn't exceeding the speed limit for any part of this ride) but I made it to the 101 after riding gently winding roads through cattle ranches and coastal foothills.

Full on gas I decided I'm getting a bit tired so I decide to "slab it" and take the 101 all the way home, though anyone who's been on this stretch of road will tell you that not all slab is created equally, I didn't get any of the traffic I would have seen if it were Sunday and I was home in just 2.5 hours.

This is definitely the longest ride I've ever done, and by far the most concentrated saddle time I've ever tried. I wanted to see how I'd do, the verdict is that while the stock seat might be a problem my knees are definitely the weak link in any long distance riding plans I might have. I will definitely need to come up with some kind of highway peg solution if I want to do >500 mile days (or certainly any kind of Iron Butt ride)

Anyways, I suck at thinking about taking pictures when I ride, but here's the track I recorded with my cell phone.

10168203_5582ce9f03_o.jpg


 
That's almost the exact ride we did the next day, but in reverse! If you haven't done Lockwood Valley (about in the middle of the 33, DO IT! IMO the best stretch of road in so cal. Glad you had a great birthday ride.

Did you check for your photos on the snake yet?

Clicky

 
ummm let me know when you wanna go....

LINK

just a sample of some of the BEST roads in SoCal. this area makes Lockwood look a lot like Florida..... :clapping: :clapping:

R

 
i am guessing you havn't done Pines to Palms yet.......
No, of course in my case that's a 115 mile mostly slab ride just to get to the start of the ride, with another 150 miles of slab to get home from the end. I guess the distance would be similar to what I just did but seems like a limited amount of good roads for the effort involved.

I do want to ride Ortega Hwy this summer, maybe I can do that at the same time.

 
This is the view from the top

P1020405.jpg


And the slab ride is a much fun as you want it to be....

and it is only 80m miles to the start of the fun stuff.

R

 
why are you local guys not coming on our DV ride or the ride to Big Sur for lunch on April 14th?

R

 
Yes.......do continue....

If you wait to be invited you will never go anywhere....

Check out the California section for all our rides, we are also going to Canada in June and Eureka for the Gathering of the clans for the first weekend in August.

get your butt out and ride.

R

 
I will do that. And I ride damn near every day. Unfortunately it's mostly on the freeway.

Where in Canada? My wife is Canadian. I got her from CanadianBrides.com.

I'm just kidding. She hates when I say that. My mother in law has alzheimers and we need to go up around that time anyways. Perhaps the wife could fly and I could ride :)

 
BC...Castlegar to be exact....we are leaving Monday June 18th.

R
Okay Canada is out. 3 weeks vaca and one week is already committed to Yellowstone. Another 1.5 dedicated to the mother in law trip. Unfortunately they live on the far side of Saskatchetoon :huh:

Will try to make Eureka though. Are you guys doing the whole trip in one day?

 
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