On The Road
by: Bill Oetinger 1/1/2024
Ida Clayton? Yes!
Happy New Year! Yes indeed, it is that time again: time for new beginnings and new possibilities…and, in the case of this column, new pavement.
I know, I know…I’ve prattled on a few times before about the state of asphalt in the North Bay, but bear with me here as I roast that old chestnut one more time. Two things occurred at just about the same time a few weeks ago to get me going on this topic once again…
First off, I heard on the local cycling grapevine that a wonderful but rather obscure cycling road has just been repaved (to a very high standard): Ida Clayton Road. If you know the road, you don’t need me to explain where it is or where it goes. And if you do know it, you’ll be as tickled as I am to learn about its new paving.
But if you don’t know the road—which is more likely to be the case—I will give you a quick summary about it. It’s eight miles long, rising up out of Knights Valley, the remote, quiet region just south of Alexander Valley and just north of Napa County. It’s not a dead end, although it is often ridden as one, because, over the summit, up on the shoulder of Mt St Helena, it turns to gravel and tilts down into Lake County very steeply. Its name changes too, to Western Mine Road.
Riding through on Western Mine commits a cyclist to a long, hard loop. For years, the Santa Rosa Cycling Club offered an annual ride called the Clear Lake Double Metric that did just that, with a start/finish in Healdsburg. As the name implies, it took 125 miles to close the loop and most of that was hard, friggin’ work.
If were weren’t up for something that hard, we would occasionally ride to the summit, where the pavement ends, take a break, and then turn around and head back down the hill. This is what I did on a cold December Saturday recently. I parked my car at San Miguel School, north of Santa Rosa, and rode out Faught and Chalk Hill to Hwy 128, south to Ida Clayton. With a little bonus loop in Knights Valley, it was a bit over 50 miles. Just about right for a nippy winter day.
The big challenge is the main climb, which of course becomes the big payback on the return trip. According to Ride With GPS, it’s exactly four miles at an average of 8.4%, with the steepest pitches around 13%. That’s not the hardest climb you’ve ever done, but it is serious work, lasting most of an hour (at least at my tempo).
Once the main climb is done, there is a pleasant level cruise for about three miles, all in a forest that does a passable New England fall color display in November. (It was just at the tail end of that seasonal turning when I rode it.) And then, finally, there is another, shorter climb to the tippy-top summit. While the big climb has been paved beautifully, I am sorry to report that, about halfway through the level traverse, they packed up their paving stuff and went home. The last bit up to the last summit still has the atrocious pavement of yore.
That’s a little puzzling: why go to all the trouble to pave the first six miles and leave the last two in their same sorry old shape? But what’s even more puzzling is why they paved this road at all. Mind you, I’m not complaining! The new asphalt is faultless…asphaltless? Even climbing is easier with such a smooth surface: you can tap out a nice, steady cadence without lumping and bumping through potholes and patches. But of course the marquee attraction is the descent back to the valley…hooowheee! Serious gravity candy!
But with all the roads around the county needing attention, why the public works folks chose this very out-of-the-way road for an expensive makeover is…odd. I mean, it almost literally goes nowhere, and there are probably no more than a dozen driveways off the road in eight miles. Doesn’t exactly seem like a high priority. This is not the first time they’ve elected to pave some remote roads (but ones cyclists love). Cavedale and Lichau and Schultz are another few back-country byways that surprised us when they were repaved but that we all were happy to have resurfaced.
The other thing that occurred just about the time I heard about Ida Clayton was that my biking pal Charles Beck sent me an e-mail with a jpg attached of a painting he had done. Charles, in addition to being an excellent cyclist and all-around nice guy, is an excellent painter, mostly of North Bay landscapes…often the hills around his home on Joy Road, above Occidental. You can visit his website and see for yourself.
Anyway, what was the subject of this new painting? Ida Clayton and nearby Mt St Helena. I replied to his note, reminding him about the two of us doing that Clear Lake Double Metric together at least once, back a few years…what a hard ride it was, but so gloriously beautiful.
He replied and added a bit of hot news: Bittner Road, the really tasty descent near his home and studio, slinking and twisting down to Occidental, has just been paved too. With all the rain we’ve been having, I haven’t had a chance to get out there yet. But it’s on my to-do list.
Whatever bureaucratic voodoo Sonoma County is employing to arrange its paving priorities, the results are looking good for back road biking. I used to piss and moan about how lousy the roads were in this region, but over the past few years, my, how things have changed. There are still quite a few lumpy old roads out there but not nearly as many as there used to be. Ida Clayton and Bittner are just a couple of the many roads that got spiffed up this year, and reports in the local paper say much more is planned for next year. Keep it up! Every mile of new pavement just makes riding in Sonoma County that much better.
Bill can be reached at srccride@sonic.net