Gooseberry Mesa

This has got to be one of the coolest bike trails in the world. Gooseberry Mesa is just above Hurricane, Utah, and you can see it easily from I-15 on the left as you are headed down into St. George from Cedar City. My Dad and I rode the trails up there this past Saturday and it was just awesome.

After surviving the cockroaches at the Econo Lodge in St George we headed up to Hurricane along highway 59, which eventually dead-ends on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. We only got about 15 miles though, past the eastern end of the mesa, before turning left onto a dirt road running off as far as the eye can see. We followed that road for a while, then turned onto another road that ran out onto the top of the mesa. It was rocky and rough, but the Man Van (my Dad's old '96 Dodge Caravan w/ no A/C and plenty of room in the back for mountain bikes) has been through worse. After a long and bumpy ride, it was nice to arrive at the gravel parking lot for the Gooseberry Mesa Trail!

The parking lot definitely isn't in the coolest spot on the Mesa. Its surrounded by sagebrush and cedar trees. But you can see the cliffs surrounding the entrance to Zion National Park in the background. When we got there it was before 9:00, so the Sun had only just hit the top of the Mesa. It was still chilly and breezy, and a bunch of campers were cooking breakfast nearby. Their campfires smelled really good (cedar) and made me want to go camping... After some quick lube jobs and double-checking air pressure, we hit the trail.

The surface of Gooseberry Mesa is made up mostly of a loose-but-firm gravelly rock, with huge

slabs of slickrock scattered everywhere. Some of these slabs rise gently out of the regular

surface, while others stick straight up out of the ground to form huge domes. The Trail connects these slabs of slickrock together, so you get to ride all over one big dome and all over the rock around it, and then head off to the next one. Sometimes these domes rise so close together that you are winding around on trail right in between the walls of rock.

Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures of us riding right in between these walls of rock, but that was pretty fun. We cruised around from rock to rock for several miles. The slickrock is really great for bike riding because it allows you to do things that regular mountain soil won't let you do. It grips your tires better, so you can do stunts and ride obstacles that would be a lot more tricky or even impossible on dirt. Ledges are everywhere, and you can't always see them coming because the rock plays tricks on your depth perception, so you have to be constantly ready to bunny-hop or pull back as you go unexpectedly airborne. It is a full-body workout!

All that work is rewarded though by one of the best climactic scenery points ever!

No, Jason isn't back from his mission already. This picture was actually taken last Fall when Dad and Jason went without me... Bums. Pictures do not do it justice though. To the North you get a complete panorama of Zion Nation Park from the Kolob Canyons area all the way to the entrance to Zion Canyon, with all of the landmarks in between, like Watchman and Lava Point. To the South is another endless series of Mesas all lined up row by row. With nothing in the way, the Grand Canyon would be easily visible. So Dad and I took some time to take a few pictures and listen to a guy tell us the story about how he ripped his shorts right in the crotch area while he was riding ... we didn't ask to hear it ... and then we headed back to the Man Van.

I've been riding a full-suspension Specialized Stumpjumper since 2005 -- a very comfortable ride and I have enjoyed it. Dad had been riding a hard-tail (no rear suspension) Giant Iguana since 2003 until recently. This was his first time on full-suspension (in style! he now has a 2008 Gary Fisher Roscoe II! a $4500 bike that he didn't pay nearly that much for). The slickrock on Gooseberry Mesa is particularly rough, and after a few hours riding hard-tail, you feel pretty beat up. Well, after completing the trail yesterday on his Gary Fisher, here is how Dad felt.

Impressive. Great ride. And we made it back in time to see the end of the BYU game.