MacDuncan 132 Posted February 20, 2016 Friday morning, PELLOS said sure, lets meet at Pio Pico/ thousand trails for a quick jaunt up otay. Once I left El Cajon around 7:30 am and navigated those dang traffic breaks near the new Jamul Casino, I was treated to the very green pastures and the low clouds blended with the local peaks..... which immediately opened the spiritual flood gates of exactly why I ride.... I was transformed to a place that was thousands of miles away from my city responsibilities We cruised up and up, smoothly, easily, cautiously, and took the east branch at the top. Wandered out the standard road and took a few of the rougher dirt roads up, around and out, and back, knowing that if we had more courage and better skill sets we could likely ride up a lot more of those dirt sections, and connect them at the tops of those gnarly peaks.... but we didn't, and all was good. We did our standard polite waves to the border patrol agents and then cruised to the caged concrete bunkers, and then downward towards Otay.... thinking we might call it a day since we didn't want to have the hassle of the action that seems to be happening east of the Water Park with that area becoming more restricted. The gate at the BLM entry was open so we decided to head straight down that funky slippery marble top dirt until we hit the border fence. A couple more nods to Border Patrol until one truck finally waved us over and asked us "What the heck are you guys doing back here, no one is allowed back here any more, and motorcycle groups should know that by now". I mentioned that we often take this route, have for years, and haven't been told otherwise. They said that they could not issue tickets/citations to us, but don't want us there ever again, but warned us that the BLM manager may likely be down the road where we were headed and he would be happy to write some expensive tickets to us for being there when we shouldn't. We said thank you politely and headed east. On the way, we gave a few more nods to the men in white trucks, .... it didn't seem to be a problem. That valley is spectacular with the rugged crevices to the north - nice country! We finally crossed the river bed and began our windy ascent towards Tecate Peak, although we were still a valley west of it. Up and over the last saddle and down towards Barrett, a truly nice ride.... then I thought I heard sirens.... so thinking it was likely a fire truck on hiway 94 reverberating up the Valley, I cruised along. Suddenly, Pellos snugged his bike up closer to me on the descent and gave the cordial beep beep, so I pulled over to see what was up. He said he thought the Border Patrol Truck was chasing us with flashing lihts and sirens, and had been for a few miles. At that time I looked up to the top of about 8 switch backs and saw the flashing lights and an agent waving to me to stop right there. I pulled off the main road and turned off the bike and took off my helmet and waited. He zipped down to us and asked us why we thought we could be in a restricted area and that we would need to drive back to Otay mountain. I politely told him that we would not have enough gas to do that, that we were sorry to be in a place that he thought we should not be and that to accommodate his need, we would immediately leave the area a couple miles down the road we were on in order to get on hiway 94. He initially said that would be impossible since the road ends in a locked gate. I reminded him that there is often a way to exit around that gate. He said that would not be ok this time, but due to our polite nature, he would call another agent to meet us and open the gate so we could exit the restricted area properly. We again apologized and politely departed. Upon arrival to the gate, and thinking I would exit up to the right, someone had put a pillow and some rubber mats over some fallen barb wire on the left towards the river... so we waited for a few, but then departed as we would have since no agent was there to open the gate.... but ....having had some adventure action, we decided to head east instead of west and get some gas in Campo. It was so dang nice out and we rode about as fast and any one might on a drz with knobs into tight turns on the way to Campo, 94 was beautiful.... cool, brisk air, oak trees,... might as well have been near some little town in Colorado given the way we were feeling. We gassed up, watched other bike touring bikes wander by for about 5 minutes and then headed up Buckman Sp., then Cameron Truck, over to Kitchen Cr, to Fred, Thing, Sunrise, Oh my, Oh my... the recent dampness made that route spectacular!!! Then to asphalt to Cuyamaca Lake, to Engineer, to Boulder Creek to Descanso Cafe. A beer and a bacon Burger later, we headed home. Our small Otay spin was 180 miles. Seems about right for a damn good day on the enduro. Wish you were there. Cheers. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
paulmbowers 236 Posted February 20, 2016 Yeah- the good old days seem to be over down there. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
