In Celebration of Resiliency

CRSP Ride Report, 10/30/23

Lately, San Diego media outlets have covered the 2003 Cedar Fire, this being the time/weeks/month 20 years ago when one of the largest and deadliest wildfires in recorded CA history decimated the Cuyamaca mountains, burning some 275,000+ acres of land. I didn’t live here then, but friends did. Countless stories have come into my understanding of the land where I love to mountain bike.

For me, mostly, without the reference point of living here before the fire, I cannot imagine, nor feel, the loss of the Ponderosa and Jeffrey pines. What I know is that many people talked about that forest as being like “the Sierra Nevada mountains.” Some of it, though very, very little, can be found in pockets. Today, you see a transitioning forest, one that scientists say will likely be an oak forest of the future. Pine reforestation efforts don’t seem to be going so well. Why? Climate change.

Riding the Cuyamaca Big Loop, some of those pines can be found around Lake Cuyamaca. It never fails; whenever I pedal this stretch of trail, the blue water and green pines and the golden grasses all come together in a way that puts me directly in the “present tense.”

Climbing up Milk Ranch, you get to see the snags. In the world of forestry and fire ecology, there is disagreement about leaving snags where they are versus removing them. (If that interests you, take a deep dive on the interwebs, or leave it to the experts to debate and go ride your bike instead.)

Up and up, I went, past the springs and on up some more. Up there, at the crest, the views were spectacular. I considered snapping some photos, but what for, I thought. Photos almost never capture the complete picture/experience.

Chilly, late fall mornings provide clear, soft light, the land and sky a crisp reminder to get up early and go.

Along the way, I saw and heard turkeys, jays, woodpeckers and took comfort in nature’s resiliency, knowing that out there, there were/are also bobcats and deer and mountain lions. The forest may look different, but as a friend always says, “nature bats last.”