Don't know if any of you monkeys ride in Auburn, and probably don't now that N* is open, but I thought I'd post up a post fire ride report. You may have not heard that there was a fire there about a week ago. Well, after a week of not riding, we had the idea that it would be fun to go hit up and see what the trail condition was like. I'm coming off a broken wrist, so I wasn't riding, and was just loaning my bike out, shuttling, and taking pics.
The night before, George informs me that "according to the news, the smoke is mostly gone and the fire is totally out." I was a bit skeptical, since the fire JUST happened, Auburn is right below the inversion layer, and CA is on fire. I had driven through Auburn a week and a half ago, and you couldn't see more then a mile for the smoke. But I was game, and at 9:30 am the next morning I shoot him a text telling him I'd be down to shuttle if he and David (his roomate) wanted to go.
They'd been drinking the night before (I'm on hiatus because I realized I'm already a total alcoholic and need to cut back), so it wasn't the fastest start ever, but we were in the car heading to Jack in the Box by 10:15.
As we started moving up into the foothills, the smoke was pretty bad. Even in Sac it was pretty noticeable. Doubt began to take over. We got to Auburn and it was pretty gnar, but we were planning on meeting a guy there, and David and George decided they wanted to go for it anyway. We called the guy to let him know we were only doing one run, and that he shouldn't bother coming - it was too smokey for more then that.
It was pretty smokey
I dropped em off near the top, drove down to the half way point and the turnoff for the road down to mammoth bar, and started hiking up the tunnel trail (top half of the confluence trail).
The fire got to it
It was pretty bizarre - the trail was in almost perfect condition, no ash or anything on it, but the sides of the trail were just black and white covered with char and ash. Very weird to see.
I met them at that rocky right hander and snapped some pics there. Unfortunately they came out looking like the trail was about as flat as a pancake, and opted not to post any pics of them because its quite a blow to my ego. I had them wait for me at the top of the little uphill after that straightaway rocky section while I came and caught up to them and passed them to snap some more pics.
David and George
David coming down
George had some mechanicals, his front big chainring was missing a bolt and wobbling so he started walking
I told him to Man up and put it in the granny gear
We took a brief break at the car while I headed down the road to snap some pics at the gap off the road and then the following hip.
Coming into the gap
George
David landing the following hip by doing it to flat instead of hipping.
I headed back up to the car and drove down and met them. We cruised to the river and chilled for awhile. We forgot the beers in the car, but when we checked em out they turned out to be hot, so I guess we didn't miss out on much. The trail looked remarkably good from what I saw. The only damage report I heard was of the two berms right after the double after the tunnel had been cleared out for a fire break and were just 3-4 inches of powdered dirt.
It was a pretty successful ride, good times were had by all, but its still nowhere near clear enough skies to consider shuttling all day. One ride (hell, even hiking up the trail a little bit) was enough to F*** our lungs. Definitely advise as strongly as I can NOT XC riding there for awhile. It will be extremely hazardous to your health.
From the position of the fire, It looked like the only DH trail that had been effected was tunnel - stonewall and murder looked totally fine. The OHV trails weren't in the right position to have been hit at all. We didn't do any climbing obviously, but I'm guessing the trail that wraps around the hill starting at the bridge and ending at the top by Tunnel was probably hit in a couple places (at least). Based on the destruction (or lack there of) on tunnel, I'd guess the trail is probably still in ok condition for the moment.
We'll see what happens when winter rolls around and it starts raining. Probably be a big help if you can spend a day doing maint when the trails get wet, since I have a feeling without all the trees the rains gonna hit pretty hard.
Will
PS: I did play with the saturation of the "Coming into the gap" picture because it looked cool, but Auburn is nowhere near that green. Ever.
The night before, George informs me that "according to the news, the smoke is mostly gone and the fire is totally out." I was a bit skeptical, since the fire JUST happened, Auburn is right below the inversion layer, and CA is on fire. I had driven through Auburn a week and a half ago, and you couldn't see more then a mile for the smoke. But I was game, and at 9:30 am the next morning I shoot him a text telling him I'd be down to shuttle if he and David (his roomate) wanted to go.
They'd been drinking the night before (I'm on hiatus because I realized I'm already a total alcoholic and need to cut back), so it wasn't the fastest start ever, but we were in the car heading to Jack in the Box by 10:15.
As we started moving up into the foothills, the smoke was pretty bad. Even in Sac it was pretty noticeable. Doubt began to take over. We got to Auburn and it was pretty gnar, but we were planning on meeting a guy there, and David and George decided they wanted to go for it anyway. We called the guy to let him know we were only doing one run, and that he shouldn't bother coming - it was too smokey for more then that.
It was pretty smokey
I dropped em off near the top, drove down to the half way point and the turnoff for the road down to mammoth bar, and started hiking up the tunnel trail (top half of the confluence trail).
The fire got to it
It was pretty bizarre - the trail was in almost perfect condition, no ash or anything on it, but the sides of the trail were just black and white covered with char and ash. Very weird to see.
I met them at that rocky right hander and snapped some pics there. Unfortunately they came out looking like the trail was about as flat as a pancake, and opted not to post any pics of them because its quite a blow to my ego. I had them wait for me at the top of the little uphill after that straightaway rocky section while I came and caught up to them and passed them to snap some more pics.
David and George
David coming down
George had some mechanicals, his front big chainring was missing a bolt and wobbling so he started walking
I told him to Man up and put it in the granny gear
We took a brief break at the car while I headed down the road to snap some pics at the gap off the road and then the following hip.
Coming into the gap
George
David landing the following hip by doing it to flat instead of hipping.
I headed back up to the car and drove down and met them. We cruised to the river and chilled for awhile. We forgot the beers in the car, but when we checked em out they turned out to be hot, so I guess we didn't miss out on much. The trail looked remarkably good from what I saw. The only damage report I heard was of the two berms right after the double after the tunnel had been cleared out for a fire break and were just 3-4 inches of powdered dirt.
It was a pretty successful ride, good times were had by all, but its still nowhere near clear enough skies to consider shuttling all day. One ride (hell, even hiking up the trail a little bit) was enough to F*** our lungs. Definitely advise as strongly as I can NOT XC riding there for awhile. It will be extremely hazardous to your health.
From the position of the fire, It looked like the only DH trail that had been effected was tunnel - stonewall and murder looked totally fine. The OHV trails weren't in the right position to have been hit at all. We didn't do any climbing obviously, but I'm guessing the trail that wraps around the hill starting at the bridge and ending at the top by Tunnel was probably hit in a couple places (at least). Based on the destruction (or lack there of) on tunnel, I'd guess the trail is probably still in ok condition for the moment.
We'll see what happens when winter rolls around and it starts raining. Probably be a big help if you can spend a day doing maint when the trails get wet, since I have a feeling without all the trees the rains gonna hit pretty hard.
Will
PS: I did play with the saturation of the "Coming into the gap" picture because it looked cool, but Auburn is nowhere near that green. Ever.