Looks like it had been over two years since I last visited Carrizo Gorge (more details on this ride at the Jan 1 2017 post) but was interested in biking a little further along the railway this time. We got a nice early start at about 8a and particularly enjoyed the first two cool hours of the day. A lot of the bike ride was as I remembered it except unfortunately this time the first short tunnel had a padlock and gate requiring a 1000ft walk-a-bike detour and the longest tunnel further also was locked, requiring a 1 mile singletrack detour overgrown with agave and cholla. Both detours certainly detracted from the former ride by adding about 40 minutes of unnecessary travel. Despite the detours I was still very thrilled to be biking and not hiking as the three other groups we encountered were. Someone had patched up some of the holes and missing planks in some of the bridges and repaired some of the uneven gratings so that was nice at least. Lots of cacti in bloom. The native dudleyas were already getting their late season blushes of pinks and reds.
The tunnels were plentiful enough to break up the desert heat. If anything the singletrack immediately adjacent to the tracks was even more ride-able than I remembered. We needed headlamps for two of the tunnels. I chose to ride across all the bridges including Goat Canyon Trestle was still had some adrenaline to offer up. We went as far as three tunnels and three half-bridges past the Goat Canyon Trestle before turning around to make sure we had ample time for a quick nursery stop and a tasty meal. On the way back we had a pretty strong headwind, even pushing us around a bit.
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