If humanity is truly the product of ones’ environment then the sensation of relaxation that I’m feeling tonight can be directly attributed to three consecutive days of absolutely stellar riding which ultimately culminated this morning with a trip to California State Road-2, better known as The Angeles Crest Highway. Sitting here now it’s hard to ignore that this 66- mile long rollercoaster of a road is truly one of the most magnificent rides on the face of the planet.
At the start The Crest stands a mere 865 feet above sea level but it eventually rises to a little over 7,000 feet in elevation and during the rather rapid and remarkable ascent the transformation in topography, wildlife and sheer speed is almost overwhelming. What starts in a mellow community quickly becomes all-out super speedway wrapped around conifer trees and majestic views of endless mountaintops.
In many ways the road diametrically opposite to the Westside LA riding areas because unlike the roads that traverse The Santa Monica Mountains, The Crest is a flat-out fast piece of asphalt. Instead of being built on a collection of tight, twisting, technical turns, the Angeles Crest is made up of bends and corners that continuously sweep in almost unthinkable ways. They seldom seem to pause. Each corner flows into the next and it makes catching your breath almost impossible - not because you physically can’t do it but rather because in the time it takes you to think about doing it you’re already into the next sequence of sweeping turns. On this road one sequence begets another, and then another, and before you know it you’ve been riding for thirty miles and are still grasping for air under your face shield.
It’s truly a remarkable sensation. Almost racetrack-like, which probably explains why the road is routinely considered a ticket trap waiting to happen. Today was no exception; there were several highly patrolled areas that gave riders like myself pause. In some respects I understand the vigilance of the police. I don’t know if it was because of the extremely warm weather with temps pushing 95 but this morning attracted a far more diverse crowd of road racers than the Malibu canyons normally seem to. While most of the folks were wearing leathers, I was surprised how many packs of the t-shirt/shorts wearing crowd passed by. I suppose there are many things that I don’t understand about motorcycles, but I fail to see the logic in wearing shorts and a sleeveless shirt while riding a 600cc sportbike or a full-blown literbike. I mean what do these folks think is going to happen when they lay the bike down?
While I can’t fathom that kind of self-induced suffering, I can completely understand why The Crest is held in such high regard amongst riders. If you take away the traffic, the squids and the highway patrol The Angeles Crest is an absolutely killer stretch of road and the more I reflect back on riding it this morning, the more impressed I am with how diverse the act of riding can feel in throughout the various parts of the Los Angeles Basin. To have so many roads with such differing personalities standing so close to one another is truly remarkable. It leaves me wondering if the men who built these roads in the first quarter of the 20th-century ever stood back and realized what they were creating. I wonder if they had any inkling of how spectacular their collective creations would seem seventy or eighty years later, when the far corners of the globe that they were trying to connect suddenly felt much closer together thanks to modern technology.
Some more picts from the ride:
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