I wanted an escape from cold snowy Ohio, as well as an opportunity to test out my new touring bike. Initially I was planning to take a week-long trip later in the spring, after I'd had the opportunity to ride some more and build up my fitness, but my sister in San Francisco talked me into visiting this week, in February. My sister was also interested in trying a bit of bike-touring., so we decided to start with a little two-day trip.

So, after a bit of research we decided to follow the first day of the bay area triple crossover, camp at Samuel P. Taylor, and then ride back to SF on paved roads along the bay.

We made it like a third of the way out before bailing.

The first part of the trip was okay, but once we hit the Miwok trail? Forget it. This trail is really only ideal for mountain bikes, and that's the only kind of bike that also happened to be on the trail. It was very steep, very muddy, there were often deep ruts, as well as loads of rocks and pretty serious bumps, and super-tight switchbacks that in some cases we preferred to walk around. We honestly probably spent at least half the time just pushing the bikes, even in many flat sections because our tires would slip out in the mud.

This trail is really only suitable for people in very good shape, who are lightly loaded, and have a bicycle with fairly knobby tires and super low gearing. My own bike is an entirely stock co-op adv1.1 with road tires, and was loaded with a bunch of the gear I'd expect most tourers would have.