# Bakersfield, CA...cycling mecca?



## centurionomega (Jan 12, 2005)

I grew up here before moving to the pleasant climes of the San Francisco Bay Area.

I went to visit my dad and was able to bring along a bike to head out for some rides.

There is a great MUT called the Kern River Parkway Bike Trail that runs from the west side of town all the way to the east side. It is usually not too heavily utilized because Bakersfield is so f-in hot all of the time.

I set out for a pre-dawn ride (beat the 100 degree heat) up to my sister's house on the east side of town to go sweep pine needles off of her roof. If you've never tried sweeping off a roof wearing cycling clothes and shoes, it is such a great time.

The town is mostly __F_L_A_T__. Historically, this area in Kern County was a giant inland lake. The east side of town has some good, but short climbs. I got to ride the China Grade Loop climb as seen in the Amgen Tour of California a couple of times. It is a real pushover.

There were a few other folks out riding; I even got a picture of a guy going up the climb before I zoomed past him. Riding in SF has turned me into a flat land monster. Easily topped 20 mph average speed over 2 hours.

On the way back I struck out across town to get a few shots of personally important landmarks. Most importantly, Noriega's restaurant is the best. Family-style Basque food. I've never eaten there and not had the best time. Also, the restaurant has its own jai alai court attached. I've never seen it in use though.

I'm not sure about the Rabobank connection.

Front Porch Music was where I bought my first guitar.

The Nile Theatre had discount second-run movies. Now I believe they have rock shows there.

The Padre Hotel used to be run by an ultra-Libertarian type dude. The city tried to force him to put in a sprinkler system. Instead he closed all the rooms above the 2nd floor. Then, he started erecting mock missiles on the roof. Other high school kids used to get to the upper floors somehow and party. I never was able to do that. Now, it has been bought and turned into luxury accommodations.

The drivers were strikingly friendly and non-confrontational. Since my earlier days, the number of bike lanes has grown from zero to plentiful. It is good to see that cycling is now acceptable in Bakersfield!

The best part was finishing my ride at my favorite burger joint Leo's Burgers. The last shot is my lunch, well-earned after a great ride.

Thanks for looking!


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## froze (Sep 15, 2002)

The Bakersfield Travel Agent? 

I use to live there till 2003. I use to ride the Kern River Parkway all the time. Another hot spot for riders on the weekends is the ride up Brickenridge, or up further to Lake Isabella. The longest one day ride I ever took was while living there, left Bakersfield at 5am to beat the heat of the desert floor, and ran Taft hwy west into Taft then south on West Side hwy to Maricopa hwy into Ojai, circled around Lake Casitas onto Casitas pass road down to the coast onto the 1 and the 101 and ran that into Santa Barbara; 158 mile ride in 11 or so hours.

Bakersfield does get real hot especially between mid July and mid August where temps will exceed 100 degrees. But what I hated the most about that area was the air pollution, and it's gotten worse since I've been there and is rated the number 1 or 2 highest particulate pollution in the US. The 2nd most hated aspect to Bakersfield is it's population that's has grown by over 100,000 people since I left there, and the streets were crowded then!

I don't think the area is a mecca, I think Denver/Boulder area has that title, I think the mecca of California is San Diego, though I actually prefer the Santa Barbara area the best.

The best bike shop in town is Team Action Sports, Kerry runs a great store and if the same mechanic is still there he was extremely good, probably the best mechanic I ever meant.


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## weltyed (Feb 6, 2004)

those pics look like they were taken back in 1981.


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## No Fences (Sep 24, 2012)

Great pictorial. I rode the time trial loop today. As a new road rider, the hills were tougher than I thought they would be ....


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## froze (Sep 15, 2002)

Is old man Clerou still alive? He is or was one tough old German bird that's for sure.

By the way, you mentioned non-confrontational drivers? As compared to what? SF? Where I live now in Fort Wayne IN would appear to be Mayberry USA compared to Bakersfield!


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## centurionomega (Jan 12, 2005)

*cycling mecca (tongue in cheek)*



froze said:


> By the way, you mentioned non-confrontational drivers? As compared to what? SF? Where I live now in Fort Wayne IN would appear to be Mayberry USA compared to Bakersfield!


I grew up in Bakersfield and have been riding since 1974. I had numerous times where cars passed at high speed at an unsafe distance, or would yell something or honk right when they were passing to scare the sh!t out of you. Also got chopped several times by people turning in front of me. This kind of crap never happens to me in SF.

To call Bakersfield an example of 'car culture' would be an understatement. I was just surprised how many bike lanes on city streets there are now. Truthfully, two days of riding probably isn't enough of a statistical database to make any predictions regarding drivers attitudes to cyclists. I think in the Bay Area, drivers expect cyclists to be on the road and behave more cooperatively.

BTW, your ride to Santa Barbara sounded totally awesome. Was it solo?


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## mohair_chair (Oct 3, 2002)

What, no shots of Buck Owen's Crystal Palace??? No love for the Bakersfield sound???


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## froze (Sep 15, 2002)

centurionomega said:


> I grew up in Bakersfield and have been riding since 1974. I had numerous times where cars passed at high speed at an unsafe distance, or would yell something or honk right when they were passing to scare the sh!t out of you. Also got chopped several times by people turning in front of me. This kind of crap never happens to me in SF.
> 
> To call Bakersfield an example of 'car culture' would be an understatement. I was just surprised how many bike lanes on city streets there are now. Truthfully, two days of riding probably isn't enough of a statistical database to make any predictions regarding drivers attitudes to cyclists. I think in the Bay Area, drivers expect cyclists to be on the road and behave more cooperatively.
> 
> BTW, your ride to Santa Barbara sounded totally awesome. Was it solo?


The Santa Barbara ride was solo. I took 4 Polar water bottles (plus food of course), two on the bike and two on a twin pack on the rear seat post with me instead of taking two or three and a Camelbak like I normally do when I rode up to Lake Isabella all the time because I didn't want the weight on my back for that many miles. Made three planned 15 minute stops to get more fluid, food, stretch and walk around, one in Ventucopa, Ojai, and the last in Carpinteria (that last stop I didn't fill my rear bottles). My in-laws live in Santa Barbara so my wife left Bakersfield about 10am with the kids so I had a ride home with them on Sunday which was a good thing since my ass was not my friend anymore! It was a great ride but it got pretty hot by the time I hit the mountains but not as hot as it would have been that day on the desert floor had I left later. It was a huge heat relief when I hit Ojai and when I got closer to the ocean of course. 

I made sure I had more then enough fluid food which I stuffed the food in a handlebar bag along with a light jacket just in case the coast got too cool. I had to put my flat repair patches, spare tube, spare tire, and tools in the handlebar bag because the seat bag I had wouldn't fit with the twin bottle carrier back there.

I pre froze solid my two rear Polar bottles before I started just to make sure I had cold drinks during the hottest part of the ride. 

Would I ever do that many miles in one day again? Doubtful. Even though I was use to riding 100 plus miles on a weekend you would think another 50 is no big deal, but adding another 50 miles of grueling heat and climbing made me really sore all over. Now that I live in the flat lands of Indiana maybe I could do 158 miles but I just don't have any desire to spend that much time on a bike, I'm 59 now and I had back surgery last December, and back starts to ache at anything over 75 miles. I do however have plans in 15 years when I retire to tour across the USA using Cycling Adventure maps and maybe the east to west portion across use one of their organize trips then continue on my own after that leg. Hopefully by then the back will have settled down and I can do 50 mile daily average in relative comfort.

If you ever want an adventure you should try that. I know that Action Sports use to lead a group of cyclists once a year to Pismo Beach via the 58; and they have a weekly riding event where they all get together throughout the week and ride some place, check with them about their schedule. Some of those events get pretty spirited though so make sure you enquire about each one to see if your up to the challenge.

Get to know those people at Action Sports, the owner, Kerry Ryan was the team captain of the 2001 4 person RAAM team that won that division and set a course record. He knows what he's talking about. Highly knowledgeable and a very nice person in addition to being a honest but shrewd business man. When I lived there the only other bike shops in town worth anything was The Finish Line and Sniders, but they lacked in the knowledge and ability that Action Sports has or at least had. The only thing I didn't like about Action Sports was their dependence at the time on Trek/Bontrager as their majority of bicycles and gear they sold, so most accessories I bought came from the other two stores because they sold other brands I was more interested in. 

It's a great area to ride in but words of caution...do not ride when the wind blows too much because the wind can kick up a spore that causes Valley Fever, they have a cure for it now but not when I lived there, but it's a pain to get and cyclists and runners are prone for it due to them inhaling deeply when they cycle or run. The other times to be careful about is when they harvest the nut trees, the sky fills with the dust from machines shaking the trees and I'm not so sure one should be riding or running with that stuff entering the lungs. And you need to keep in eye on the particulate pollution levels, when the levels get too high they will post warnings, heed those warnings.


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## centurionomega (Jan 12, 2005)

*I know, I know*



mohair_chair said:


> What, no shots of Buck Owen's Crystal Palace??? No love for the Bakersfield sound???


That is right across the river from the bike path. Shoulda, coulda got a pic.

Buck used to play there every weekend up until his death, but I never ponied up the $ to check him out.

I never liked Country Music growing up; KUZZ stickers were on every pickup truck you would see! It took moving away from B-field for my appreciation to grow. I did play pool @ Trout's in Oildale a couple of times. The Buckaroos used to play there. An old lady barfly told me the meaning of 'big ones' and 'little ones'.


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## froze (Sep 15, 2002)

Buck Owens, he was a very nice man to his employees, but when he got older his singing sounded like someone shoved a rag into his mouth and he tried to sing without taking the rag out...yup, it was horrible, he should had retired from singing long before he died.

He got the name Buck because once a year he would sell some employee chosen at random a car he bought new and used it for a year for $1, that's right, one dollar, and these were not cheap cars, of course the buyer was responsible for actual value taxes and registration. I know one year for Christmas he had all the employees go down to one of the car dealers in town and they could buy any car they wanted up to $25,000, not sure if he had done that before but I have a feeling he was very generous at Christmas time.


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## SantaCruz (Mar 22, 2002)

Bay-kerrs-feeeeeld....... just a truck stop ..... in my life.

There's a sad, windy, dusty, country song in there somewhere.


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## DrRoebuck (May 10, 2004)

Great report and great pics. Driven past Bakersfield a bunch of times and ridden through on the moto on the way to Lake Isabella, but haven't _seen_ it.



froze said:


> The longest one day ride I ever took was while living there, left Bakersfield at 5am to beat the heat of the desert floor, and ran Taft hwy west into Taft then south on West Side hwy to Maricopa hwy into Ojai, circled around Lake Casitas onto Casitas pass road down to the coast onto the 1 and the 101 and ran that into Santa Barbara; 158 mile ride in 11 or so hours.


Holy. ****ing. ****.


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## froze (Sep 15, 2002)

DrRoebuck said:


> Great report and great pics. Driven past Bakersfield a bunch of times and ridden through on the moto on the way to Lake Isabella, but haven't _seen_ it.
> 
> 
> Holy. ****ing. ****.


There's a lot of guys here that have ridden further then that in one day, question is was the terrain as mountainous as I had to endure? Fortunately my wife met me in Santa Barbara at her parents place so I didn't to ride back the next day because my arse and legs were to sore to make to return trip, but I was able to walk around in Santa Barbara with the wife and kids.

It's actually a wonder ride, I pre-drove it the car about a month prior just to see what was along the way before I rode the bike on it, wonderful scenery, my wife loved it, but it was a longer drive compared to taking the 99 to the 5 to 126 to the 101, so she didn't want to go that way more then once. But if you want a great ride on the moto you should run that route sometime. 

Bakersfield is not much to look at, it's a dirty city if you ask me, but so are all the towns on the 99 till you get to Sacramento.


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## DrRoebuck (May 10, 2004)

froze said:


> There's a lot of guys here that have ridden further then that in one day, question is was the terrain as mountainous as I had to endure? Fortunately my wife met me in Santa Barbara at her parents place so I didn't to ride back the next day because my arse and legs were to sore to make to return trip, but I was able to walk around in Santa Barbara with the wife and kids.
> 
> It's actually a wonder ride, I pre-drove it the car about a month prior just to see what was along the way before I rode the bike on it, wonderful scenery, my wife loved it, but it was a longer drive compared to taking the 99 to the 5 to 126 to the 101, so she didn't want to go that way more then once. But if you want a great ride on the moto you should run that route sometime.


Trust me, that whole area (Ojai, 33, Lockwood Valley, Mt. Pinos, Maricopa, Taft, Soda Lake) is like my moto backyard. Ridden various routes in and around there probably a dozen times. That's why I knew how awesome and tough that ride must have been. At least 10,000-ft of climbing, right?

Your wife should have taken the 166 all the way across to the coast.


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## froze (Sep 15, 2002)

DrRoebuck said:


> Trust me, that whole area (Ojai, 33, Lockwood Valley, Mt. Pinos, Maricopa, Taft, Soda Lake) is like my moto backyard. Ridden various routes in and around there probably a dozen times. That's why I knew how awesome and tough that ride must have been. At least 10,000-ft of climbing, right?
> 
> Your wife should have taken the 166 all the way across to the coast.


I don't recall the foot of climbing rate I thought it was only about 5,000 feet elevation at the highest point, but it was intense...at least for me.

The fastest route to Santa Barbara from Bakersfield via car is the 99 to 5 to 126 to 101 route, check any mapping system and it will only show that route. There are couple of routes I could have taken by bicycle but I chose that one due to the availability of more towns and it was shortest. There is a non-paved route (I think part of it was a fire road) that is shorter but I was on a road bike and the availability of towns would have been far less plus in case something happened I wanted a road that had car traffic.


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## Gnarly 928 (Nov 19, 2005)

Nobody mentioned the rides out towards Tehachipi. There are great climbing roads, quite small and little used, out that way....Caliente to Lake Isabella and around that area... Whenever I travel by car that way I like to try to time my trip to get a ride in there....


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## froze (Sep 15, 2002)

Gnarly 928 said:


> Nobody mentioned the rides out towards Tehachipi. There are great climbing roads, quite small and little used, out that way....Caliente to Lake Isabella and around that area... Whenever I travel by car that way I like to try to time my trip to get a ride in there....


I lived in that region for over 14 years, Palmdale/lancaster/Bakersfield area and never got around to riding in Tehachapi, not sure why! 

But I did get out to Caliente and Lake Isabella and surrounding communties a lot, and rode out to Porterville a few times. When I lived in Palmdale/Lancaster I made it out to Mojave, Boron, Victorville and surrounding towns, up to Wrightwood etc. I rode several times from Palmdale/Lancaster area to Barstow, BUT I stopped in Victorville to visit a friend for the evening, next day go on to Barstow then came back and stopped again at Victorville over night then back home the next day. But while in Bakersfield I took the longest single day trip in my life when I rode to Santa Barbara, CA.

I never bothered with loading the bike onto a car and drive an hour then ride. Plenty of times I went out of town on trips or visited someone and took my bike along to ride when I got there, but never took the car just to go someplace for the sole purpose of riding after my racing years ended, and I still don't do that today. Maybe when I retired and get bored I may do that to find more areas to ride.


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## centurionomega (Jan 12, 2005)

*legendary ride*



Gnarly 928 said:


> Nobody mentioned the rides out towards Tehachipi.


That reminds me. It is family legend that one time my brother, when he was stationed out at Edwards AFB, rode with a friend from the base through Mojave, up over the Tehachapi pass and then on into Bakersfield.

This was in the late '70s and I guess you could still ride a bike on Hwy 58?

The thing that makes it legendary is that his crank broke about 30 miles outside of Bakersfield and he had to finish the route with one pedal.

I can barely remember his bike ride happening, but it sounds fun.


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## froze (Sep 15, 2002)

centurionomega said:


> That reminds me. It is family legend that one time my brother, when he was stationed out at Edwards AFB, rode with a friend from the base through Mojave, up over the Tehachapi pass and then on into Bakersfield.
> 
> This was in the late '70s and I guess you could still ride a bike on Hwy 58?
> 
> ...


I don't think that cyclists were allowed on 58 from Bakersfield all the way to Mojave due to secondary roads that are available which leads me to believe their not allowed. But, back in the 70's that 58 was lightly traveled and not the busy major highway as it is today, so in the 70's it may have been possible but I seriously doubt that has been legal for quite some time.

When was 14 I was racing a friend on my crappy Puch 10 speed when a crank broke, I raced the guy for 2 or 3 miles with just one crank and I beat him! But to go 30 miles, it could be done but what a pain especially for the thighs. I remember my thigh burning just from that short trip though I was going ape trying to beat the guy.


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## ispoke (Feb 28, 2005)

I have good memories of working in Bakersfield on and off over the years. Most recently a coupla years ago. It's always felt to me like a fairly quiet, not too big of a town. The folks I met there through work have been friendly and much more laid back than people on the LA side of the grapevine. I don't recall many good restaurants in BAK. Mostly chains. And yeah, the air quality isn't so great between the stockyards and the oilfields. Dare I admit it has a nice familiarity!

That Kern River Trail is a nice ride. Had my bike in town a couple times (maybe fall/spring) and really enjoyed riding along the river. Compared to LA, it was nice to have such a casual ride without vehicular hassles and without many roadies either. Plenty of time to think or just gaze at the open land.

So, ummm... no mention of Dwight Yoakum? I know Buck was the king, but Yoakum took the Bakersfield sound and launched it into the stratosphere...


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## froze (Sep 15, 2002)

ispoke said:


> I have good memories of working in Bakersfield on and off over the years. Most recently a coupla years ago. It's always felt to me like a fairly quiet, not too big of a town. The folks I met there through work have been friendly and much more laid back than people on the LA side of the grapevine. I don't recall many good restaurants in BAK. Mostly chains. And yeah, the air quality isn't so great between the stockyards and the oilfields. Dare I admit it has a nice familiarity!
> 
> That Kern River Trail is a nice ride. Had my bike in town a couple times (maybe fall/spring) and really enjoyed riding along the river. Compared to LA, it was nice to have such a casual ride without vehicular hassles and without many roadies either. Plenty of time to think or just gaze at the open land.
> 
> So, ummm... no mention of Dwight Yoakum? I know Buck was the king, but Yoakum took the Bakersfield sound and launched it into the stratosphere...


Good restaurants were a bit lacking when I lived their although they had a few really good Mexican restaurants and a couple of nice Italian restaurants, and a really nice Vietnamese restaurant. Franchise restaurants are every where these days now matter where you live.

I was just there a year ago and it's gotten crazy in my opinion. When I lived there there were about 200,000 people living there, now it's around 350,000, and that extra 150,000 people has put a lot of traffic on the streets. Add on top of that the fact that Kern county grew from 500,000 people when I lived there to 850,000; and some of those people work in Bakersfield adding additional traffic stress.

The pollution issue is mostly from China not locally! Locally in the north part of Bakersfield it just stinks from the oil, but the dangerous particulate pollution is from China that swings across the San Francisco area picking up their smog then swings down the San Joaquin Valley picking up of that crud and dumps it on Bakersfield. And when the aversion layer sets in it gets darn right nasty to breath and health warnings go up.

But I did like the Kern River Trail, and the mountain roads around the area for riding, the only positive thing about living in Bakersfield besides low housing cost and cheap and fresh food year round.

I'm not big into country music, I did once go to the Crystal Cathedral to hear Buck sing and wish I hadn't gone because his singing by then was horrible, sounded like he stuffed his shirt in his mouth and then went out to sing.


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