I've been itching to get back to Palm Canyon since our last ride there in March. I have tried doing rides in Palm Springs in late summer before and know how brutally hot it gets, even with a 6am start. The solution? Ride it at night! As a bonus I thought it would be really cool to do this on a full moon so that we would not have to waste lights on the sand wash.

We were all a bit concerned about how this would go...Palm Canyon can exact a huge toll in terms of mechanicals, and the prospect of light failure adds a whole new dimension of risk to the ride. Fortunately, we would not need to worry about freezing, with forecast low temps of mid-60's up top and mid 80's at the bottom. We were weighed down with lots of water, food, and 2-3 sets of lights each, plus spare camping headlamp and the usual complement of armor. Well, after reminding everyone several times to bring pads, I managed to forget my hard shell legs pads.

90 degrees at 6:45pm....the boys get ready to do battle.


406 talked me into starting early enough to have light on the drop into the canyon. The bonus was some great light for pics. Unfortunately, we dropped down the shady side of the canyon so it was hard to take advantage of it.


On the first HAB we get a sampling of what is to come, cactus-wise. The stringy ones with extra sharp thorns that hang over the trail were thick in places as the locals have not done their annual trimming workday yet.


Kreechan with last sunlight on Santa Rosa






Dropping down the ridge


406 and Shake-n-bake (Allen) far below




Things were not going well early on as Kreechan tears a sidewall of his tubeless tire


Meanwhile, 406 and Allen wait for us at the bottom


I forgot my shin pads, but the yellow pages came through for me!


Approaching "the willows" section at last light


"The willows" are now "the jungle"


406 pushes through heavy brush


We finally give in and put on our lights soon after the willows




The moon makes an appearance


Some sections were much harder at night


Best part of taking pictures in the dark is the facial expressions you can get from unsuspecting victims. 406 does his best "deer in the headlights"


One of the locals




406 on the steep part of Indian Potrero, which is looking...not so steep


My phone books looking a little worse for wear as we get to the sand wash. Better them than my legs!


Armor and lights come off


Into the abyss


Temps were deceptively hot, so while the sand wash as surprisingly well-packed most of the way, we were still sweating buckets. A rest stop at the Oasis cooled us off.


For baja


HBV by night


406 looking spry


Hitting wildhorse summit


We rest and take in the lights of Palm springs




Garston intersection...the home stretch


We got back to the hotel around 230am. Things had cooled down a lot by then and the spin back to Motel6 cooled us down nicely. Kreechan will have to post up stats...our riding time was very good, but we stopped a lot towards the end. It may still be too warm to do this as a night ride on very hot summer days....I think the high in PS was 110. But if you can catch it below 100 for a high the night ride is a very viable option for this ride in summer.

I was very impressed with the trail condition aside from the expected cactus overgrowing the trail in places and the willows jungle. At times we would have cholla balls being flung by our tires in every direction, I was amazed we only had one flat from that. The wash was as packed as I've seen it since our rain ride, which was amazing - maybe 1/4 to 1/3 of it was soft, the rest was middle ring cruising.

The moonlight on the wash was a highlight for me. I walked 2/3 of it just to soak in the experience.

Awesome ride guys, thanks for coming along. This was definitely a great experience!

Awesome TR. Sounds like a great experience.

_________________
~I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.
~Nothing from nothing is nothing.
~I'm allowed to be a pussy because I have one!

A great experience indeed!
(I enjoyed nightriding so much that I went on a short full moon excursion up and down Cowles today - also a lot of fun!)
But back to the PC nightride. Here are some stats as requested:

Distance: 29.64 mi (includes 2.5 mile cruise back to the hotel)
Moving Time: 04:19:09 (Ah well, for night rides I can make an exception to the 6h requirement )

Elapsed Time: 08:00:32 (yes, lots of breaks. It was way past my normal bedtime and I just wanted to sleep whenever I got off the bike)

Elevation Gain: 2,111 ft (sorry Allen, I know it felt like more)
Elevation Loss: 6,177 ft (as sweet as always)
Min Elevation: 272 ft (110F before shuttle, maybe 85F at 2:30 am)
Max Elevation: 4,363 ft (only a little bit cooler)

Nice! Wish I could have joined you. Taking in the lights of Palm Springs from the top of HBV past midnight had to be awesome.

I like the new shinguards. Nice TR, looks like a very cool adventure.

_________________
"We'll ride it until they pave it."

-Big Clyde

Looks like Kreechan tore his sidewall in almost the exact section where I have done the same thing twice! Bad tire mojo on that stretch!

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http://paleovelo.com/

Way cool TR.

We need to get both of you some run-flat bike tires

Finishing a ride at 2AM has to be awesome! How was the burn time on the lights? No worries?


Well, that is cowardice



Things were not going well early on as Kreechan tears a sidewall of his tubeless tire.


Time for a UST rated REAR tire?

There is a weight penalty (yes, cost $ too) compared to a non-UST tire but for Clydes/aggressive riding (the "trails" being riden lately) the beefier UST versions can give peace of mind. Not sure what the ultimate tire is, but do I see a Maxxis High Roller 2.35 UST rear tire in your future Kreechan?

Kreechan, I think he just called you fat!


Burn time on lights was fine, I didn't pull out the second magicshine battery

I think he photo-shopped the picture too -
otherwise, guilty as charged, if >200lbs = clyde
need to ride more...

Or maybe I just need to tape some phone book pages to my sidewalls?

_________________
http://paleovelo.com/

Geeze, I would have never guessed you were so badly over-weight Christian! Thanks to Evan for being the first to be brave enough to point out the obvious with his keen observation (of the picture/and my statement).

However, I put " but for Clydes/aggressive riders....." only because I think Christian is an brilliantly aggressive rider and I am obviously the equipment destroying Clydesdale.

Here is a fun pic of the uber-agressive rider Christian (and his signature Deuter pack) dropping in on a crazy staircase with a death drop (secret trail in the San Gabriel Mtns at about the 9700 ft elevation ).

Now that is a nice use of photoshop!!! Am I riding 406's Turner or Baha's stumpy there? I think you could have done some photoshop magic about that big butt though