Southern California - Zumaque / Artesian Road passable

I'm looking for new routes through Rancho Santa Fe. Someone told me about Zumaque St., which intersects with the Stud Loop Backwards route. When I look at Google Maps, Zumaque appears to merge into Artesian Road, which you can then take to Camino del Sur. But when I looked at it in satellite view, I wasn't sure it was passable. I'm not sure how old the satellite pics are.

Has anyone ridden this route? Is it passable, and if so, relatively safe (at least as safe as everything else is in RSF)?

Google 'zumaque strava'
Sure looks like others have ridden the route you describe. I don't ride in that area tho.
Strava awesome for checking out routes.

Haven't ridden out that way in 14 years, but used to use it to commute from Solana Beach to Rancho Bernardo. There was a locked gate at the bottom of Zumaque, but it is passable on bike or on foot. There was a stream crossing about 200 meters further on, but I'm sure it's dry this time of year.

In case anyone is still interested. Rode the route today westwards (Artesian to Zumaque). Ray R is pretty much spot on. It's paved all the way through. There is a bridge over a stream at the bottom of the canyon, it looks like it would be submerged in any but the driest conditions, but is dry now. At the bottom of Zumaque, there's a sliding gate with a keypad, it looks like you could climb over it (3-4 feet high); while I was standing there inspecting the gate, a car pulled up behind me, the driver entered the code and let me through. Zumaque climb is not for the faint-hearted, average 10% with short stretches up to 15% and total elevation gain of 250 feet.

After two days of rain, the bridge is covered with 1-2" of water. Still perfectly passable on a road bike though. The gate is still there and still locked, it took me about 15 seconds out of the saddle to hop over. Zumaque is still as steep as I remember.

Artesian Rd. is all paved now? Last time I rode it 14 years ago it was unpaved and washboarded, still ridable on a road bike. I have some great memories of peaceful pre-dawn rides to RB with tule fog and the redolent wild grasses, illuminated by my puny Night Sun headlight.

It's all paved. If you haven't been there since 1998, you won't recognize much of the area. Wild grasses are mostly gone. There's a large development at the intersection of Artesian and Camino Del Sur (was it called Camino Del Norte back then?) Camino Del Norte goes all the way through to San Dieguito Road and Carmel Valley Road.

That's sad to hear. We've lost almost all the wild places in SoCal. I'll miss MTB rides on Del Mar mesa as well. Too bad they couldn't have saved a little more from the Vogon bulldozers.