Southern California - Rides near Sequoia Nat'l park?

Hi SoCal folks!

Does anyone know of any good road rides near Sequoia Nat'l Park and/or Porterville? I'll be there for a weekend in late Sept, but need to keep my training up for a ride in October.

Thanks in advance :)

You can always ride up into the park itself. It's beautiful, and if you park down in Three Rivers, you won't even have to pay the entrance fee. There is no bike lane, but the park-wide speed limit is 25mph, and since many of Sequoia's visitors are European, they have a more humanitarian view of bicyclists than your typical Texan or Arizonan tourist. Just be sure to bring at least a 39-25 along, because there are a few sustained steep sections, which make it a fun, fun, fun descent!

http://www.calamarichris.com/images/090814-felt-seq.jpg
http://www.calamarichris.com/images/090814-felto.jpg
http://www.calamarichris.com/images/090814-seq-trees.jpg
http://www.calamarichris.com/images/090814-burnt-tree.jpg

Also, check out the 245 going North of Woodlake. It starts out down in the rural, less attractive valley, but eventually goes up silly-string roads (that were deserted when I was there) in the trees.

Start in Springville and head north on Hwy J37 then right onto Balch Park Rd. The road rolls for a few miles then starts a long (~20 mile) climb up a one lane road with amazing views and almost no traffic. The climb is steady and never gets very steep. After a while the road starts to roll through a lush forest and eventually enters a sequoia grove near balch park campground. Descend down Bear Creek Rd and back to the start. IIRC its around 45 miles with 5500 ft of climbing.

:thumb:

thanks, those rides both look fantastic

The climb up from Three Rivers into the park would be amazing but they're doing major construction on the road and it's only open for a short time in each direction for 10 minutes every hour, so I'm not sure they'd even let you up or down it right now.

The climb up from Three Rivers into the park would be amazing but they're doing major construction on the road and it's only open for a short time in each direction for 10 minutes every hour, so I'm not sure they'd even let you up or down it right now.

That's REALLY good to know, thanks

We were up in Tulare Co earlier this year. Great riding. I can look up the rides on my Garmin if this is in the area you are headed.
Very hilly and beautiful.

I'll be over in Porterville, if you can pull up the garmin routes, that would be great. Thanks.

Ended up doing the Balch Park Road route. That's quite a climb :D Very nice riding in that part of the state, I'm already looking forward to next time.

I appreciate all the info, thanks!