Bootleg Canyon
by Rob Blue on September 30th, 2006
The show is over but Mikel and I couldn’t resist getting a ride in before we left Nevada. After giving our thanks and saying goodbye to my friend Scott we headed out to Bootleg Canyon.
Mikel and I had never ridden here before. This is where they have the InterBike Outdoor Demo every year but we have never made it out for that. Bootleg Canyon is over by the Hoover Dam right next to Boulder City and Lake Mead. Two things struck us as we parked the car:
1) there are no trees
2) there is no dirt, only rocks
This is a lot different than the riding in California. Lucky for us it wasn’t too hot so after getting all of our stuff together we started riding.
They are doing some renovations to the parking area so we had to wander around a bit to find the way to the trailhead. Once we figured it out, Mikel tore the sidewall of his Kenda Karma. Even a healthy dose of Stan’s NoTubes won’t save an half inch long slash in the sidewall.
There was no way we were going to only get 5 minutes into a ride and call it quits, so out came the dollar boot.
We didn’t get very far before Mikel realized he needed more air. Then the valve core ripped out while trying to pump it up a bit. We had no choice but head back to the car and get a new tire and tube (I didn’t bring any extra NoTubes – bad move).
No we were really ready to go. We topped off our water and hit the trails. Bootleg Canyon is unforgiving in it’s rocky terrain but the single track was awesome. Very well designed with a really great flow.
I wish we had more places to ride that were designed like this in Los Angeles. The variety was amazing. They had all kinds of jumps and bridges.
Check out our ride on Google Earth by downloading this file:
Between the show and the gathering heat of the afternoon we didn’t last very long out there. After calling it quits we packed up and headed over to the second of the two Aurelio’s Pizza places in Las Vegas.
I even had them pack me a frozen one in ice to bring home.
We spent the drive back listening to tunes on Sirius and trying to figure out how many languages we could make my car speak in. Spanish and French were all that we could get going. Dr. Z’s car would not do German, go figure.
September 30th, 2007 at 10:48 am
[…] After our drive across the dam, we headed out to Boot Leg Canyon where the Interbike Dirt Demo was held a few days earlier. What a cool place. Lots of climbing, but its rewarded very nicely with some excellent fast single track. At first it was a bit sketchy, but as I rode I found that the very sharp and jaggy rocks acted like sand paper. My Kenda Nevegals grabed on so well I was hardly ever worried about slipping on the rocks and falling. [read last years interbike 2006 road trip here] […]