Stagecoach 400 - Indian Creek, Decanso and on to Alpine

The single track alongside Sunrise Highway was fun, and had a few riders on it. Then I got to do a few miles on the highway itself and that went well. Finally I got to the Noble Canyon trailhead and turned in there, stopped and filled my water bottles.

I really liked the Noble Canyon track, thought it was pretty, and had a nice flow to it.  Met some hikers at the Indian Creek turnoff and chatted with them for a bit.  Then downhill to the creek, crossed it and started around Indian Creek.  I stopped for a couple of minutes and heard another rider come from behind me and pulled my bike out of his way .. he went on, and then I went on .. and then I found him a few minutes later, with a derailleur knocked off his bike by a big rock that he had ran over and it "popped up" and got his bike.

So I stopped, and dug out my chain breaker and another rider came up and the three of us figured out the best way to get him going again as a single speed.  Nice to have some tools with me, even had a chunk of duct tape to tape up the dangling cable.  He went back towards his car, and I kept going on the Indian Creek path, which is a bit narrow in places with drops that could cause some damage to you if you went over the edge !

Finally got to a fire road, passed Granite Springs and saw some of the biggest oak trees I have ever seen.  Got to ride through some beautiful meadows and then through Cuyamaca State Park and back to Highway 79 ( a place I had just passed earlier in the morning as I went uphill on 79 to Cuyamaca Lake ).

Beautiful Meadow in Cuyamaca State Park

On to Descanso, where I stopped at Veronica's and had a really great Carne Asada burrito, a root beer float and iced tea, and felt really good after that.  Then I headed for Alpine and got to ride downhill on Viejas Grade.

Could be an Ent 

I was surprised to see the cue sheet instructions telling us to go straight on Willows Road instead of the Interstate on-ramp and we had another little piece of dirt that got us onto neighborhood streets avoiding a lot of car traffic ( Sweet ! )

Refueling at Veronicas

I headed to the Ayres Hotel in Alpine, got a room and got some supper at the Montana Grill where I devoured most of a giant place of pot roast.  All in all, it was a pretty good day, could have ridden further but was good to get done with those big hilly single track sections from Mt Laguna on to Cuyamaca State Park.

Viejas Grade