The monthly barn dance at Pie Ranch is hands-down my favorite destination for a hoe-down. A bike camping trip to this tiny slice of a farm is easy as pie and just as wholesome. Check out the trip at-at-a-glance for route details. Day One: 45 miles to Pescadero from Menlo Park Caltrain Station Our crew of […]
Read More Pie-Powered Pedaling to PescaderoThe monthly barn dance at Pie Ranch is hands-down my favorite destination for a hoe-down. A bike camping trip to this tiny slice of a farm is easy as pie and just as wholesome. Trip at a glanceRoute: Pie Ranch is located on Hwy 1 just south of Pescadero. To make it in time for dancing, […]
Read More Potluck and Barn Dance at Pie RanchYoked to the slip-strike San Andreas Fault, the red-orange spires of Pinnacles National Monument have crept northwards for the past 22 million years. Today, Pinnacles lays 50 miles south of Gilroy, making it conveniently accessible by Caltrain for the weekend bike camper. I got off the Caltrain in Gilroy in full dark and headed south […]
Read More Pinnacles Bike and HikeContinued from Part II. Conclusion Three weeks later, I’m recovering from ankle tendonitis and feeling very removed from the adventurer who found exhilaration, wonder, and the generosity of strangers on the road. Who endured fatigue and self-doubt on dark lonely highways. Yet, I can recover each day in sparkling detail. I can’t say that about […]
Read More Riding Home for New Year’s Eve — Part III, ConclusionContinued from Part I. Last spring, a friend rode from San Francisco to Bakersfield in less than a day. Chatting over chicken pot pies two days later, he said he was looking for his breaking point and mused, with a quiet sort of delight, that he didn’t hit it. Infected by this madness, I’ve been […]
Read More Riding Home for New Year’s Eve — Part IIA couple days after Christmas, I went on my usual bike ride in the East Bay Hills and reflected on 2011. There was as glaring gap in the year’s activitides — I had forgone an epic bike tour! With four days left in the year, it was decided — I was going to load up […]
Read More Riding Home for New Year’s Eve — Part INo tinsel or collapsible trees for us! This Christmas Eve, friends and I dispensed with the holiday trappings and went camping instead. We were a motley crew — mountain bikes, minibikes, trailers, an Xtracycle carrying baguettes and myself on the racy Cannondale tandem with my stoker Marc. We rode across the Golden Gate and stopped […]
Read More Steep Ravine Hot Springs Christmas Eve CampoutI completed Bike-About Feat #1 with an extra cherry on top. Due to a wrong turn that put an extra 12 miles onto my journey, I ended up riding 99.5 miles that day. I’m rounding up for a square 100 miles — my first ever! The ride took me around the eastern flank of Mt. […]
Read More First Century EverI am being called to a bike-about. A soul searching wander in the wilderness. I first conceived this route in a naive spirit of adventure, amidst summer fieldwork in Los Padres and Angeles National Forests. Albeit bordering major metropolitan areas, these public lands remain remote and wild. I imagined a route linking the Amtrak Depot […]
Read More Bike-aboutEvery hero has an origin story. So too, bike campers. I started this blog four summers ago, after my first ever bike camping trip. After re-reading my inaugural post, Half Moon Bay Overnight, I’m still chuckling at how riding dirt, burning pallets, and carrying a whole roast chicken on my handlebars that trip set the […]
Read More Return to the Planet of the Apes
Flaming Bike 