Samuel P Taylor & Wet and wild Point Reyes Mini Trip. Ride Report and Photos

[EastBayGuy]

Hi Y'all,

It was my Uncles 50th Birthday on Saturday so I took the opportunity to make a mini trip out of it and headed out on Saturday morning and caught the first Bart train to Embarcadero  to start my Journey. The ride to Fairfax was beautiful and I arrived a bit early so I decided to ride out to Samuel P Taylor and doubled back to Fairfax for the Party.

Woke up a bit hung over and headed back to Samuel P Taylor for some relaxation and to wait for a buddy to drive and meet me for the night. The weather was amazing and clear for the night, but Monday would be a different story.

Started riding to the Point Reyes Ranger Station to check in for my campsite for the night and proceeded to Point Reyes Station for munchies at Bovine Bakery and to wait for the Rain to subside so I could push to camp. After eating to many Pastries and a few pieces of there amazing Pizza, I pressed on to Sky Camp. I decided to Hike up 3 1/2 miles up Horse Trail to Sky Camp and it was amazing even though I was getting rained on Hard all the way up. Half way up and being soaked head to toe, I was second guessing my decision to camp for the night. But I pressed on. 

Set up camp and decided to wait out the storm. I was in my tent from 8:00 Pm to 7:00 Am waiting out the storm, but the views in the morning of the fog rolling in was definitely worth the cold and wetness. It was absolutely beautiful. 

I was supposed to stay another night at Hawk Camp but that was put on hold since everything I had was soaked to the bone and I had to ride back in my flip flops, since my Sambas were filled with water in the morning. I will save that trip for when the weather is better. The medium saddle sack and my Barsack kept everything dry, with a little help from some Garbage Bags and Ponchos.

A great trip, meet allot of fellow bikers along the way and will definitely do it again. Here are a few Pictures of the trip.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/54527498@N06/sets/72157627832794810/

Cheers!

Dustin G

Walnut Creek Ca

[Joe Bernard]

Excellent ride, excellent fog. I've never bike-camped, but this makes me want to trace your route and do it. Thanks for sharing it.

 

Joe Bernard

Fairfield, CA.

[Jim Mather]

Looks like a truly epic trip! And roast pig compensates for a lot of
suffering in my book.

jim m
wc ca

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[EastBayGuy]

Thanks Jim and Joe. It was a blast. Unfortunately Jim, the Pig was at the beginning of my Journey, not after the suffering (kinda sorta suffering)

[Ryan J]

Looks like a great trip, too bad for the rain, but you got to eat a roasted pig so I would say it was a winner.  Love the scenery! 

I have a question about your bike setup as I am deciding between sackville panniers vs. large saddlesack.  Do you find having the weight that high on the rear gives you any kind of handling issues?  My Hillborne has a sackville handlebar bag attached now, but nothing to hold my stuff in the rear for camping trips yet.  The handlebar bag hasn't led to any issues in handling, but I am concerned about getting a full saddlesack along with the h-bar bag would be too much weight up high.  What do you think?  Thanks.

[EastBayGuy]

@Ryan. I have never had any experience with panniers so I cannot compare the two. I can say that with the Load up High it does NOT affect the handling that much at all. In my own opinion, with the load up high it is almost an extension of your own body weight through out the frame and does little to mess with Handling. I may be wrong but its my opinion. 95% of the Bags that are sold at Riv lift the weight up high, so there must be something to it.

[René Sterental]

Very nice ride! Riding to/around Point Reyes is on my future plans...

@Ryan. Having both the Sackville panniers (have only used them for commuting) and the Large olive SaddleSack which I used on the Mt. Diablo S24O, I can tell you that I just fell in love with the Large SaddleSack to the point that this week I used it on my commute exclusively. I like it better than the Medium I was using just because everything fits inside better and for the extra pockets. I wouldn't be surprised if I used it exclusively from now on and didn't use the Medium one again. Compared to the Sackville panniers, a lot more fits inside and while on my S24O the loaded Hunqapillar felt the added weight, it wasn't an issue at all during the ride. Another advantage is that the stuff inside is easier to keep free from outside dust/dirt/water and depending on how you "tie" them to the bag, the panniers (with zip ties in the bottoms) would make it a lot more cumbersome to fix a rear flat tire.

I am now using a pair of Carradice leather straps instead of zip ties so I can remove either set easily if I want to and reinstall it again as well. No need to carry extra zip ties, cutters, etc. like we did on our S24O (they stayed in the car).

If it was my choice, I'd probably choose the Large SaddleSack over the Sackville panniers. If you aren't carrying much either way, then I'd say the choice is yours assuming the load fits equally well on both. I'll try my Arkel panniers on my next S24O whenever I manage to make it happen, but I don't think I'll ever do an S24O with the Sackville panniers. Those are better, IMHO, for commuting or similar rides. They do look great on the bike, I have to say.

René

On Sat, Oct 8, 2011 at 4:56 PM, EastBayGuy <goodw...@gmail.com> wrote:

@Ryan. I have never had any experience with panniers so I cannot compare the two. I can say that with the Load up High it does NOT affect the handling that much at all. In my own opinion, with the load up high it is almost an extension of your own body weight through out the frame and does little to mess with Handling. I may be wrong but its my opinion. 95% of the Bags that are sold at Riv lift the weight up high, so there must be something to it.

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[Kelly Sleeper]

Plus 1 on the Large Saddlesack.  The front facing pockets are great coffee cup holders as well. 

Kelly

[Joe Bernard]

It probably has something to do with polar moment of inertia. Back in the day, Honda attempted to make their GP race bikes handle better by putting all of the weight - including the gas tank - as low as possible, and discovered they were hard to turn. It turned out the bike had a "middle" that the rider on top, and the wheels below, moved around. By putting most of the bike down around the wheels, the rider was forcing what amounted to much heavier wheels to the right as he was leaning left. In the next design, they centralized the mass in the handlebar/gas tank/seat plane, with the rider as the lighter "top", and the wheels as the lighter "bottom".

 

Having most of the mass in the middle - around seat height - made for better handling because the heaviest parts were "neutral". We think the wheels stay in a stationary position, while the rest of the bike/rider leans from that axis, but it's not true. As you lean into a corner, the wheels drift the opposite way as a counterbalance. Therefore, loading the bags closer to the rider's seat means that mass stays put while the extremities of rider and wheels pivot around it. Make sense?

 

Joe Bernard

Fairfield, CA.

[Ryan J]

Thanks for the replies everybody, you made my decision easier.  I will probably go with the saddlesack over the panniers because of the trunk-like storage vs. the split storage of panniers.  I have some time to decide for sure though because they are both out of stock at the moment.  

[René Sterental]

Joe,

Your explanation is very logical, at least for motorcycles where the machine itself is quite heavy. I'm just wondering if for a light bicycle, where the rider weight is so much higher, placing the load closer to the wheels actually achieves the same purpose. I'll have to try it next time, but it's how the touring loading has evolved over time and I assume it's for a good reason. 

I'm no expert, so just speculating...

René

Sent from my iPhone 4

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[Kelly Sleeper]

Theres numbers then there is experience. I don't know the numbers. I can tell you that small weights in the 20 ish pound range on the upper racks are not that big a deal in "most" cases. I can say from experience that the lower rider on the front handles better than on top. However I can also say that I've toured many miles with loads high and hand no difficulty. I was running panniers on an old man mountain that did fine. But that was 40ish pounds on the front alone.

So my belief is .. that if you are going trekking with large amounts of weight top and bottom the low riders and such are great and help... or large panniers that hang from a top hanging rack with most weight in the bottom. Since there is other weight on top as well this off sets and creates a better ride. That is what I've experienced. I also have no problems with a case of soda in the front basket .. but I do notice that the same weight in low riders / panniers handles better. (tack on in my opinion) (for my bikes) (in Missouri on Saturdays with 3.5 mph winds) Don't try this with full moon.

Do some load testing for yourself ... see the differences.. they are there and most cases minimal. (on sunny days when no one is watching)

Kelly

[René Sterental]

LOL Kelly!

Sent from my iPhone 4

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