I was leading a ride starting from San Juan Bautista. The plan was to go over San Juan Grade and then loop back around through Aromas. Some of this was new roads for me. That was the problem.

We were supposed to take Crazy Horse Rd for a few miles, then turn left on this other road. We didn't find any road so we ended up at Hwy 101 with no place to turn. Hwy 101 was much too busy, so we slowly went back on Crazy Horse and finally found the road sign that we were looking for. Good.

We now had the road sign, but we looked and still we saw no road. All we saw was a jeep trail heading down the hill. We all had road bikes but the trail was too much for them to handle, even though we tried for a quarter mile, much of it by walking. Too soft any muddy. Bad.

We ended up going back on Crazy Horse Rd, then instead of going back over San Juan Grade again, we decided to attempt the Old Stage Rd, which I had never been on either. This went along for a few miles and then turned to dirt, which I knew it would. It was "ridable" dirt, though, so we all kept going. Good.

At the top of the hill, I was releaved to find out that the downhill was also ridable, so we all made it back to San Juan Bautista ok. Almost none of the route this day had been in the plan, but we all had a good adventure.

-Don