After about 20 minutes driving, we arrived at Montana de Oro State Park, which overlooks the Pacific Coast. After a brief stop at the park station for trail maps, we got underway on our bikes.

We followed the Islay Creek Trail to the East Boundary Trail. Joe pulled out front again and blazed the way up the hill.

I followed close behind for a while, then dropped back to catch Dan and Scott in a photo. As Joe continued, the trail grew steeper and crowded with rocks. At a particularly difficult section, he came upon a woman hiking down the same path. Something deep inside him gathered more strength at that point, and he grinded his way up an incredibly step and technical path to pass the woman with a curt, "hello". Just around the corner and out of sight, he careened off into the bushes in exhaustion.

A minute later the hiker woman passed me as I sat poised trailside with camera in hand. "Taking a break?" she asked. She wore leather hiking boots, tall red socks, and her calves and ankles were solid from untold previous trips like this one. I explained that I was waiting to capture a couple of friends in an action photo as they came around the corner. She had just come up the Ridge Trail, which Dan had indicated earlier as one of the most difficult paths -- the one we would descend. "Oh, are you with the other guy?", nodding up the hill where Joe went. And with that, she smiled and was gone.

Scott's poor front suspension, combined with his already injured elbow, was beginning to wear down on him. By the time we reached the top of the East Boundary Trail and prepared to descend the Ridge Trail, it was bad enough to consider an easier way down the mountain. Consulting the trail guide we picked up from the park station, the Manzanita Trail seemed to offer an alternative, and hopefully gentler route.

As it turned out, this was not to be.

We jumped railroad ties followed by two foot dropoffs, which were laid across the trail to reduce soil erosion. We plowed through deep trenches filled with sand. We ripped through singletrack obscured by overgrown weeds and bushes. It was near the end of an entire day of mountain biking, and we were beginning to get sloppy.

I turned a corner and found Joe with a swollen wrist and a hole torn in his britches. A railroad tie had flipped him for a complete loop over the handlebars. After a couple of words about upgrading his front suspension, he was good to go again. We continued. Scott was not looking happy, but nevertheless plugged methodically downhill.

Mystery Butt. A member of the team suffers injury.
...who is it?

Then, from behind us in a deeply overgrown section of trail, Dan and I heard Scott calling, "My leg! Something's wrong with my leg!" Fearing the worst, we reversed course and returned into the bushes to find Scott. He sat alongside the trail holding his calf. "Something's stinging my leg!" Dan and I had just come through the same path, and knew that he had hit a patch of Stinging Nettles, a plant which defends itself by injecting a burning liquid into the skin of anyone brushing against it. It's not fatal or even serious, but it can be extremely annoying till it wears off in an hour or so. Scott was not familiar with the plant, and his fears were running wild -- was an allergic reaction, or perhaps a flesh-eating virus that was attacking his leg? I turned around to continue downhill, and as I emerged from the greenery, I could hear Dan trying to turn around in the nettles... "Ouch! Ouch! F*&%! Ouch!"

Dan and Scott emerge from the stinging nettles.

Eventually the Manzanita Trail led to the Bloody Nose Trail, and then back to the paved road, which we followed to our parked cars.

At the end of the ride.