King Range: The lost coast

We heard about the King Range National Conservation Area and Tolken Bike Park from Canadian friends. It's on the Lost Coast near Shelter Cove. The coast here is the most isolated in mainland USA. Tolken sits 2000ft above the ocean and only 2 miles away, the hills are steep. We drove up the US101 from San Francisco and at Garberville turned towards the coast for the 26 miles to the campground. This was one slow road in an RV, near the turn into Tolken the road was so steep we wondered if the RV would make it up. At one point the speed was below 10mph. We finally turned into King Peak Rd which was dirt, narrow and again very steep in sections. Tolken campground only has limited spaces available, the thought of there not being a spare camp space was not a happy one at this time. Luckily the campground had cleared out after the Memorial Day long weekend, relief!

The campground is in beautiful forest. The bike park is purpose built and a skills park starts at the campground, very nice! The skills park had small, medium and large runs, each about 500m and were full of berms, jumps and a couple of wall rides. The main circuit is a 14 miles loop with 2800ft of climbing in a circuit. Luckily there are some local runs to do for the not so enthusiastic. The full circuit was awesome, two massive descents full of fast corners, berms and rolling jumps. It doesn't get any better than Man Queens Tango on the backside of the course! Adding to the experience is the isolation and beautiful surroundings. Luckily Rob met Roland a retired Fireman (55 and fat pension thank you) to ride with. It's always good to ride with someone else, particularly one with paramedic skills, so you can push 100%. He was riding a new Carbon Bronson with an X01 drivetrain (32 front). Circuit 2 his legs suffered, not a convincing advertisement for a 1x11 drivetrains and big climbs.

Rare glimpse of the coast far below

There was plenty of local riding with all of us. Symi enjoyed the skills park, getting some airtime and honing her berm skills. This was also a very relaxing place, you just needed to find some sun to sit in. The wind seemed to howl non-stop so sitting in the shade was cold.

Relaxing between rides

It would easy to spend more time in this area and do some hikes. After three nights legs and supplies were exhausted. Also the RV was also due for registration in 3 days time and required a smog test. Unfortunately we had such a good time that we only took two photos!