Sweetwater Point Trip

Steve's Mountain Bike Page
Turlock, California

Sweetwater Point

October 28, 2000

Today I joined my student Jim and his biking buddies on a ride to Sweetwater Point, off Hwy 140, just a little north of Mariposa. Since they have been biking for many years and I've only been doing it for about four months, I was a little apprehensive since I didn't know what I was getting myself into. However, everybody was cool and very patient, and they never made me feel like I was a burden. They all love going downhill extremely fast. Unfortunately, however, that means you have to get up to the top of the hills before you can descend them. There was a lot of uphill climbing. However, as long as I didn't have to worry about my speed I managed to climb all except the two steepest hills. While I was bringing up the rear the guys had no trouble amusing themselves with various jumps, descents and other mountain biking mischief. Although my fitness level has certainly increased, it is evident I have a long way to go. Much of the route was on dirt roads but there was some spectacular, very narrow, downhill singletrack among the Manzanita. I chickened out on two very steep descents. However, I'm going to have to start trying them because it kills my knees to walk down them. The trip finished up with several miles of continuous, very fast downhills on some pretty rocky old dirt roads. I want to thank the guys for having me along and giving me some good advice, tips and encouragement.

It was cool, very overcast and we were often in dark forest, so it was difficult to get good pictures without camera shake. The guys were also moving too fast for the slow shutter speeds. I don't know the exact route but for now I have included a topo map (310 kb) of the general area.

Click on an image to enlarge it