Mountain & Marine Medicine Blog: Adventures Day 21 -23

Day 23 Lower Pine Trail from Sedillo hill, NM.

The sign reads "gear grinder" with Sandias in background

I had never been to this trailhead and the loop I rode (Lower Pine to Pinion to Bear Scat to Pokerchip to Meadow singletrack to Lone Pine to Gear Grinder back to Lower Pine) was almost completely new to me, except a section of the Poker Chip trail.

Click here for an excellent map from FooMTB that I relied on for this ride.

Limestone topography here is a double edged sword. Limestone erodes into rounded spheroids, or blobs that have low friction and are easily dislodged from the soil. On any steep terrain, the trail loses its organic topsoil layer and becomes a minefield of loose balls of limestone. This process no doubt is helped by motorbikes, but this is mostly a feature of the local geology, the steepness of the trail (affecting water scouring of soil), and use. The good news is that few people are to be seen on these trails. The downside of course is that a decent chunk of this ride is not rideable. It becomes a bike push, not a bike ride. In between there are lovely sections of flowing singletrack, but the rock sections are to a mountainbiker what a waterfall is to a river rafter, a portage that needs to be circumvented before the trip can go on. There were many portages on this ride and the push to ride ratio was unfavorable. Some sections were fun to ride without dismounting too often, but I have not pieced them together yet.


Rocky ledges near the trailhead are an omen of things to come

Meadow sections of the trail were inviting, but I should have known better. The Gear Grinder trail really is unrideable. While I was riding/hiking it, I exclaimed (or cursed) out loud for it to end. It did, eventually, at the Lower Pine trail.

Nice meadow section before the pain

A view of Cedro Peak and Sandia Mountain from the Pokerchip trail

Day 22 Bear Scat Trail to Harry's Trail. This ride was accessed from Juan Tomas Road. The forest service sign to the left of the trail marker says no motor vehicles allowed. Naturally someone scratched that off, and removed another "no motor vehicles" sign on the trail (which I restored). The trail was full of motorbike tracks. Harry's is a very nice trail with a few eroded sections full of limestone boulders to be negotiated.

Bear Scat and Harry's Trail Intersection

Meadow on Harry's Trail

A beautiful meadow, of course filled with wildflowers beckons towards the hills to the North. I took a connector trail that descended towards a neighborhood to the Northwest. I imagine it links with a road near Sedillo hill. A number of unmarked side trails will have to wait for another day.


East towards the Great Plains from Bear Scat trail near the Juan Tomas Rd Trailhead.

Day 21 Yucca Mountain. On this day I did a warm up ride at Gutierrez Canyon with riding partners Sandy and Diane. In order to have 100 unique rides, I followed it up with the southern-most ride north of the freeway. This includes trail 66 and Yucca mountain, a granite knob so-named for a stainless steel yucca sculpture that looks disturbingly like a collection of missiles welcoming travelers on I40 to Albuquerque.