Lemon Grove Loop Mountain Biking, San Luis Obispo

Paul Andrews, BI editor — Mon, 04 Jul 2011 14:21:05 +0000

If you ride San Luis Obispo’s Mt. Madonna, you don’t have to stick to the fire-road climb we featured in an earlier post. There’s a fast and twisty little diversion of singletrack called the Lemon Grove Loop, taking you along the side of the mountain through grassy fields and shady ravines.

If you feel more ambitious and want to circumnavigate the mountain on mostly singletrack, you can peel off Lemon Grove Loop and ride across cow pastures to a gnarly rocky climb up the backside of Mt. Madonna. This ride is better done coming down off the top of the mountain (clockwise), but either way it’s a total hoot!

Here’s a preview of what awaits you on the Lemon Grove Loop itself.

Mount Madonna: San Luis Obispo’s Mountain Bike Romp

Paul Andrews, BI editor — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 06:44:17 +0000

After Ashland OR and Palo Alto CA, our West Coast tour next took us to San Luis Obispo along California’s Central Coast. SLO, as the natives ref it, has some killer mtb action near town, including on the Cal Poly campus and at Montana de Oro State Park right on the water.

But for a quick ride from town itself, you can’t beat Mount Madonna. Named not (as many assume) for biblical reference but rather after a prominent real-estate developer, Alex Madonna, the mound looming over SLO is a tantalizing network built around a fire-road climb to the top.

Here’s BikeIntelligencer’s video take on the Mount Madonna downhill.

Bike Intelligencer » mount madonna mountain biking

Lemon Grove Loop Mountain Biking, San Luis Obispo

Mount Madonna: San Luis Obispo’s Mountain Bike Romp