My mountain bike is thirty years old this year. Or maybe it is 28, I'll have to look that up and update this later. It is a 21-inch Giant Iguana, a little on the tall side for me, but that is what they had in stock thirty years ago at South Bay Bicycles in Torrance, CA (on Sepulveda Blvd), near where I grew up. It was the first--and last--bicycle I bought for myself.
My parents had bought me bikes before--a new bike was always an exciting birthday or Christmas present. I had been riding my brown curved-handlebar ten-speed the three-and-a-half miles to high school every day, often followed by another mile-and-a-half ride to the beach after school, when my parents bought me my first mountain bike. It was a light blue low-end mountain bike with slightly curved handlebars. All the "real" mountain bikes had straight handlebars, but it was better than a ten-speed for dirt riding.
My friends were into mountain biking and I wanted to do it too. That same year, for my 18th birthday, my parents gave me a pale-blue 1964 Dodge Dart station wagon with a roof rack that my dad and his cousin had been rebuilding in the garage. The history of that car is worth another blog post, but where that car and my mountain bikes first intersect was on my first mountain biking trip--a trip to PV (Palos Verdes). I piled five teenage boys (including myself) and five mountain bikes into/on top of the car. It was so fun. We rode the trails west of the Point Vicente Interpretive Center, back when the marine terrace at the bottom of Hawthorne Blvd was a vacant lot yet to be built on. You can't ride there anymore, thanks to the incessant development that while I was growing up sadly and inhumanely gobbled up almost all the remaining natural lands in that part of LA County. Closer to home, I saw the corridor from Wilson Park to Madrona Marsh get developed, turning the dry rustling grass into gated condominiums.
One day, I parked my light blue relatively new bike in front of the Lucky market at the corner of Crenshaw and Torrance Blvd. I didn't lock it because I was just running in quickly to get something--and then I learned the hard way to always lock my bike. I came out less than five minutes later and it was gone. Someone told me which direction the thief had gone, and I ran around the block, but my new bike was long gone. I always learn things really well the hard way.
So now I was back on my old brown ten-speed, until I bought my new Giant Iguana mountain bike.
I remember heading off to college at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo with my Dodge Dart station wagon packed full with stuff, and a wooden trailer that my dad and I customized to carry a motorcycle, and my mountain bike. While at Cal Poly, I rode to Avila Beach and Morro Bay, rode to Cuesta Ridge and Poly Canyon, even riding the rails from Cuesta Ridge down to the campus. I loved riding to Bishop Peak for a quick after-class and before-work scramble, or an early morning climb. San Luis Obispo is a very bikeable town, and I really only needed to use my car for weekend trips out of town. I rode my bike everywhere.
When I moved to Lee Vining, my bike began its first overnight adventures, including during a three-year period where I didn't own a car. During that period I replaced all the points of contact as they wore out and were sunbeaten--the handlebar grips, the seat, the pedals. I rode as far south as Lone Pine, along the way attending the Banff Mountain Film Festival in Bishop (which I attended seven years in a row--an annual camping trip celebration of spring in the Owens Valley). I saw the Aurora Borealis over the White Mountains from my Owens Valley campsite, saw a bear along the LA Aqueduct in Independence, and got a ride back with coworkers after an Owens Valley Committee tour of the Owens Lake dust control project. I rode to a Mono Basin Restoration meeting in Sacramento, crossing Monitor Pass and Carson Pass and stopping at my cousin's house in Sutter Creek after a blown tire left me stranded on Ridge Road. After the meeting I got a ride home with my friend Steve (who just recovered from a bad bicycle accident in 2019). I rode over the Bodie Hills to meet friends and spend the night at a hot spring along the Walker River during a meteor shower. I rode behind Cowtrack Mountain, spending a night in gloriously-still Adobe Valley and coming back on Hwy 120 after the snow was cleared but before it was even open to vehicles. I rode to Tuolumne Meadows many times, the best times when Tioga Road was clear but not yet open to cars. I did countless day trips up and down Tioga Pass, often with skis strapped to my bike, even riding on the snow. Once I was coming down the pass and with a tailwind reached 55 miles per hour, just below Blue Slide passing a very slow truck with a line of cars behind it--a whirlwind 20-minute ride from Yosemite's Tioga Pass entrance to my front door. One day I rode to Saddlebag Lake Reservoir, climbed North Peak, and rode home as it got dark. I think I ate both lunch and dinner that day at TPR, back when the server was the guy who would yell orders to the kitchen and yell across the room to communicate with customers. I rode 100 miles in the High Sierra Fall Century, climbing Granite Mountain along the way because it is such a fun peak to climb and I didn't have a car and I didn't get out there very often. For that ride I bought narrow rims and tires that I could switch to before paved-road rides. Once I stashed my bike at Tioga Pass so I could ride home after the Tioga Pass Run. I got up early to run to Mono Lake, then limped (my knees started hurting at Ellery Lake) up Mt. Dana after the run, connecting the lowest and highest points in the Lee Vining Creek watershed. Necessity is the mother of invention, and living without a car required creativity. I towed a kayak behind my bike on a portage cart, shot the culvert at Rush Creek, kayaked into Mono Lake, circumnavigated Paoha Island, then returned via the South Tufa overflow parking lot and a short walk to retrieve my bike at Rush Creek. One summer I lived at Burger's Retreat on Log Cabin Mine Road, a guest of the very generous Burger family, and on many days had the best commute ever, starting the day with an exhilarating ride down the steep dirt road and ending the day with a strenuous after-work climb.
Then I got married, moved to San Geronimo, had kids, and got two jobs. Life changed. The bike is still a crucial component of my transportation infrastructure. I enjoy riding my kids to school, either on a mounted-seat when small or trail-a-bike when they get bigger. The Cross-Marin Trail through Samuel P Taylor State Park is a gem, although riding through the final narrow curves of Sir Francis Drake Blvd through Lagunitas to get there can be intimidating. I've ridden to the bottom of Mt. Barnabe and climbed to the lookout tower with my kids. I've ridden to Fairfax for meetings and errands, and White's Hill--intimidating for many--is nothing compared to Tioga Pass. You just put it in low gear and pedal, and get to the top in a few minutes instead of an hour and a half.
Being around bicyclists who don't follow the rules, as everyone knows, is common, and has always been difficult--they ruin things for everyone else. They need to stop at stop signs and ride on the right, following the same rules as vehicles. I'm disappointed to see so many riders in West Marin not riding single-file, not sharing the road. Where possible I try to treat the white line as a lane line, and if you need to cross it, you signal--usually by looking behind you to see if someone is coming, and blocking traffic as little as possible. The bicyclists who don't ride single-file and ride unnecessarily-far out in the lane are just making drivers mad, and angry drivers just make everyone less safe.
The former golf course in San Geronimo, now owned by the Trust for Public Land, has been a godsend. My son was just getting the hang of riding a bike when it opened to the public two years ago. It was perfect timing--every weekend that dry sunny January we rode five car-free miles, without having to put the bikes on the car and drive somewhere else. We have been out there often over the last two years, and my son is now a seasoned bicyclist, thanks to Supervisor Rodoni and the Trust for Public Land's far-sighted generosity. When we want to go outside, we usually say "do you want to go to the golf course?" It is our go-to location for flat, sunny walking and bike riding close to home, completely transforming our lives in San Geronimo Valley. If you live in Marin County, please vote NO on Measure D in March, which would change the official land use of the parcel to be only for golf.
Living in Marin County where mountain biking was born, I am highly aware of the age of my bike when I see other bicyclists. I've never had a bike with suspension, never had a super-light ride, never ridden a motor-assisted bike (didn't those used to be called mopeds?). But my trusty heavy old mountain bike still works great. I'm a little concerned about the rusty creaky handlebars, wondering if they will just snap one day (unlikely), or if I just need to tighten them. Having two jobs and two young kids doesn't leave a lot of time for maintenance, which luckily doesn't require much because I don't ride as often as I used to, I garage my bike, and the sun and aridity aren't as severe as the Eastern Sierra. The bones of the bike are good--I think I've replaced almost everything that can be replaced, except the frame. Aside from the difficulty in getting replacement shifters that are compatible, I see no reason this bike won't last another 30 years. At which time it might qualify to be interred at the Mountain Bike Museum in Fairfax--which I still need to get around to checking out.
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