We’ve had a couple of energetic days in a row, so we look for something completely different today. It’s due to get windy this afternoon and Rachael wants a ride we can start early on and can get home to on her own rather than waiting for me bringing up the rear. I stare hard at the map and look for bike paths we might have missed thus far. I find a few, and stitch them into an odd shaped squiggle. Doesn’t look too sensible but meets specifications.
We’re out the door by 9. Warm and sunny again, but not for long because a cold front is rolling in soon. Enjoy it while we can.
Our ride begins by biking city streets west to Santa Clara, the town we based our Utah Hill ride from. From there we double back to the north to pick up a couple of short neighborhood bike trails we haven’t seen before: the Lava Flow Trail and the Sand Hollow Trail. Both are attractive trails looking about as you’d expect from their names, and the kind of resource you’d love to have in your own neighborhood.
Partway up the Sand Hollow Trail, Rocky decides she’s had enough and would prefer to get some actual exercise. She cycles on ahead, and I don’t expect to meet up again until we’re both back home.
Passing one of the many golf courses in the area, with Red Mountain behind.
From Sand Hollow we join up with the Snow Canyon Parkway,on the same route we’ve seen before when we biked up Snow Canyon last week. Today though we’re following it east for several miles to its end, as it reaches Bluff Street and turns north toward Veyo. From there it connects to the big surprise for the day, the bike path following Red Cliffs Parkway. This is another spectacular ride, one worth seeking out. True to its name, it angles up through the red cliffs north of town to a summit giving a fine overlook of Saint George and its surroundings. Like the Virgin River Parkway, this is a ride worth visiting over and over again.
Climbing up Red Hills Parkway, looking back to the west.
Looking north to Pine Valley Mountain (which I see I’ve been misnaming as simply Pine Mountain). Also, I find that it has distinction: it’s a laccolith, and allegedly the largest laccolith in the country and possibly in the world. Don’t know what a laccolith is? Look it up!
Scott AndersonTo Jen RahnYup. One reference I saw suggested visualizing the results of giving a tube of toothpaste a good squeeze. Reply to this comment 3 years ago
A sign of yesterday’s Saint George. This region, the lowest elevation and warmest in the state, has a checkered past. Known historically as Dixie, it was settled largely by Mormon immigrants from the confederate south, under Brigham Young’s mandate to grow cotton. There’s still tension here over sloughing off aspects of its heritage.
Looking down on Saint George from the summit of Red Cliffs Parkway. This is the oldest part of town, the half on the eastern side of the ridge behind it, Black Ridge. The views we’ve seen before are from the opposite side of Black Ridge.
From the summit it’s a beautiful glide east to the end of the trail, where we’re dumped into the northeast corner of town where all the malls, car dealerships, light industry and such are located. After a mile of this we cross the freeway and find our way to the north end of another short, pretty connector, the Middleton Wash Trail.
We drop through the wash for about a mile and a half before it links up to the Virgin River trail. Today, Middleton Wash is green has running water trickling down it, and is loud with frogs. I stop for several minutes trying to locate frogs that are singing just a few feet from me, but they’re apparently all hiding in crevices between the rocks.
Then, back west on the Virgin River Trail, the beautiful path we rode on our first day out after arriving here. This time I follow it all the way to its end in the Bloomington neighborhood, a few miles beyond what I’ve seen before.
At its end I double back through still another route, one that’s not that well marked and a bit hard to find the first time. What’s happening here is thatat this end of the system there are trails on both banks of the river.
This is all really quite impressive. I think that once you’ve fully oriented yourself you’d find that the cycling opportunities here are even better than those in Tucson. It sounds almost sacrilegious to say so, but it’s more scenic and more varied - you can ride the flats along the river or put in some hill work up Snow Canyon or along the Red Cliffs Parkway.
In Bloomington, I’m surprised to run into familiar face. We exchange brief pleasantries, but this is no time for chit chat. She’s hungry and in a hurry to get home for lunch.
I drop left here to cross back over the Virgin River and head home. There’s another trail off to the right though that I haven’t explored that continues further east along the south bank of the river. Next time.
