Swasey Recreation Area

Redding's BLM Land Where the Gettin' is Sooo Good

Put Swasey Recreation Area west of Redding on your list of places to ride in NorCal. You’ll need a half-day to do it right. You can also make it a longer day ride. It’s beautiful out there, the riding is flow-ey and it also is old-school-ey, which I know because I’m gettin’ old-ey.

I met up with a local board member of the Redding Trail Alliance. John turned pedals the way long-time roadies do. The cadence was wonderful to watch from behind, even though it put me in the “how am I going to keep up” mindset.

Up Escalator and then around Mule Mountain on Boheh Sas, we went. I’ll simply say this: if you are a mountain biker, you will love this start. The climb is gradual and the way around the knob gives a feeling of remoteness. All of it can be pedaled. It has all the flavor of being on a trail in the mountains, if the trail flavor is one of increased heart rate, sweat, labored breathing.

We then worked along Mule Ridge to get to the new trail, a blastin’ downhill called K’ulu:l. It was still freshly cut and needed to be ridden in, complete with some berms.

That was good old-fashioned fun, if fun = riding a bike down a mountain. After all the fun, it was time to work, if work is pedaling a bike up and up and up some more. Princess Ditch and Ono and more Boheh put us back up at Snail.

Snail was/is another signature downhill at Swasey. It, too, was a blast.

Don’t second guess, no need to think twice, when in Redding, or thereabouts, go get yourself some Swasey.

There’s a lot more out there, but my time was up. Go back? Without question.