Oscar's bike packing adventure in the USA

Thanks to snow and sun-zero temperatures in Oregon, it was too dangerous to go bikepacking there. So now we’re doing a three-day trip around northern San Francisco instead. Day 1 involved a trip from the top of Mount Tam to Angel Island.

On day two of our bikepacking trip, we woke to some amazing views of San Francisco from our campsite on Angel Island. Oscar pointed out a large deer grazing nearby, and we saw about five vultures sunning themselves in a nearby tree!

We caught the ferry back to the mainland and, after breakfasting at a local cafe, we headed out. One of the other riders, Matt, had a problem with a repeatedly-breaking chain so we detoured to a store to get it fixed. We then cycled north to Fairfax where we passed the Marin Mountain Biking Hall of Fame. After heading into the hills, we had a few more adventures before reaching our campsite for the night at Samuel Taylor Park.

Another great day with about 50 km of riding — the three youngsters did all the route-finding and handled today’s challenges brilliantly. They were awesome!

We had a visitor in the night.  A hungry raccoon must have wanted the sandwich Oscar left in the bag!

Day three of our San Francisco bikepacking adventure started with a 300 metre climb up a steep firebreak road...there was plenty of hike-a-bike on this steep 2 kilometre section. At the top, we began riding along the Bolinas Ridge, and after another 10 kilometres of mostly uphill found ourselves on the tar seal with even more climbing. From there we finally descended to Pantoll ranger station and our campground for the night.

We celebrated our last night’s camping with a fire. Apparently the best thing about the trip was the food, but these three kids did amazingly well — they all had challenges but made it to the end with a smile. Given how much noise they were making, I think the children were less tired than the grown-ups!

The fourth and final day of our adventure began with a 6 kilometre descent from our campsite at Pantoll down to Stinson Beach, where we exchanged pedals for paddles and explored the lagoon for a couple of hours. We saw plenty of pelicans and seals, as well as tons of other birds. It was a great couple of hours, and afterwards the children got a lift in the car back to Muir Beach, while most of the adults cycled -- those final 10 kilometres were hard work for us grown-ups.

Our bikepacking adventure is over, but the memories are sure to linger.