Summer In Spring Canyon

It was all drizzly this morning, an excellent day to go toiling about in the canyons north of the 52. I loaded up the bike (Jamis) and headed out. I parked at the same place I did Tuesday, near the Equestrian Staging Area (ESA).

After traversing the grassland area I head up the canyon, searching for those elusive geocaches. I found four fairly easily. Check out this map:



I backtracked a bit, then headed UP the extremely steep dirt'n'rock rock that went up the ridge. I found four caches up there. One doesn't show on the map because it was a puzzle cache. Its icon is off the map. You have to solve a puzzle to figure out the actual location of the cache. And my solving said it was way up here on this dirt'n'rock road. And thankfully, it was!

At one of the other caches up here, I got momentarily disoriented because I couldn't see the dirt'n'rock road OR my bicycle! But, just momentarily! This is why you are supposed to waypoint your vehicle before you head off the trail!

You will notice there are around ten or so caches along the way south, along the ridge, that I did not find. That is because I did not expect to go that way, and so I did not bring the coordinates. That means I shall have to trudge up these hills again, sometime!

At the farthest south cache, right above the 52, there was a nice view of the freeway and Spring Canyon. I could see some cyclists way down there.



There was a whole lump of sedimentary rock sticking out of the ground, too. It just struck me as interesting, all those rocks embedded in it. I guess this all used to be seabed or something. "Something", that sounds dumb!




This shot has all the elements. You can see the freeway, way over there to the left. You can see my bicycle leaning on that big green bush. You can see my backpack, my cache list that is so white, and just above the list is the geocache container. A very nice little cactus is present, also.



I found twelve caches today. Two of them do not show on the map, that puzzle cache, and that Did Not Find (DNF) from yesterday. I re-read the logs by other cachers, and got some clues that helped me to figure it out.

I only put about seven miles on the bike today. I wonder what my vertical gain was? There certainly was a lot of pushing UP some steep'n'rocky roads, and some bulldogging DOWN some steep'n'rocky roads.

I used to ride these same steep'n'rocky roads on motorcycle, back in the day, with no fear. But on a bicycle, at least THIS bicycle, I'm a walkin' it!