Underground Lakes

On July 11, 2025, I wrote that I had rented an all wheel drive vehicle the day before and when I woke that morning. I drove to get coffee before heading over to my friend’s house where she loaded her things into the car.

We went over the bridge and took 580 through Livermore. We got gas at Vasco Road and headed over Altamont Pass and onward to Stockton. Eventually we turned on to 88 and took Highway 49 to Sutter Creek. I told stories of the fun times I had had there while we looked at the shops and book store.

From there we headed up Sutter Creek Road and visited the Black Chasm Cavern National Natural Landmark. We had barely made it in time for the cavern tour, which turned out to be fantastic. There are a bunch of underground lakes there. They showed us the fairy cave which I thought was amazing. I bumped my head, but it was OK. I noted that the map they showed us in the visitor center afterwards was really interesting. There was also a geode display that the kids in the tour were ecstatic about.

When we were ready to go, we drove to the Town of Volcano and checked in to our tiny hotel. We had beers in the lobby and we walked over to the grocery store. We also visited Volcano Park and had dinner at the pub. The fried chicken was really good. Later we walked up to the cemetery and sat on the stoop and on the porch to manage the extreme heat of the late afternoon. That night we found Lord of The Rings in a stack of DVDs next to the antiquated player in our room.

 
This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.

We Climbed Candlestick Hill

On June 16, 2025, I wrote that my friend showed up with sandwiches before we went to the old quarry on Geneva Avenue to look at turbidites, which are fine-grained “anomalous” geologic deposits, most often shales, of turbidity currents. After that we drove over to Bayshore Park to look at the outcrops from the Franciscan Complex which makes up most of the geology of the Bay Area.

Later we climbed Candlestick Hill and I tried to figure out the specific materials of the rock. I found stuff which might be described as metabasite but there was a lot of serpentine as well. We looked at the tank on top and looked at the radio tower before returning to the bottom.

We went to the brewery nearby for a beer. The board games there were not enough so we continued to discuss geology. Later we returned to the Mission for a drink and a slice of pizza. We also ended up watching the movie Paprika.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.

East Bay Bike Party

On June 14, of 2025, I wrote that the day before I got my bike and left for East Bay Bike Party at 7pm. I went to the empanada place before boarding a train and going to Mosswood Park near MacArthur Station in Oakland. I found some close friends at the entrance. I finally was able to meet a personality from social media from Las Vegas who I had known for a long time.

I noted that other social media personalities I knew were there also. An old school cyclist with a penchant for posting pics of sandwiches was there which was really cool. Turned out I know the lady who was marvelously leading with the flag was there too. She was leading the ride with a cyclist who normally brings his disco ball trailer.

The ride went one way and another, but ended up on California. I noted that my buddy from SF took a turn. I chatted with two riders with cargo bikes just like mine about how my motor had died. The ride leader’s daughter did North Berkeley turns.

The ride ended up on an alley in Berkeley. There were plenty of old school Butter Lap and SF Bike Party people. I saw a guy I knew from North Beach. I reconnected with an acquaintance from Butter Lap.

We left leisurely and went to a place in Emeryville near Amtrak. It was called Big Tank Park or something. The dancing was marvelous. I told the ride leader it was wild. People I knew but had never seen together were asking about each other.

We departed a bit late. The ride leader took us to Seventh Street via Target. By Mandela we had lost a lot of people, but there was a lot of dancing at Lake Merritt. I got selfies with the regulars including my buddy who has a tall bike. I saw the ride leader’s roommate.

I hopped a BART train home with all of the people and when I got home, I had a grilled cheese sandwich.
This is an occasional series chronicling my life.

This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.

China Wall

On a Saturday in June of 2025, I wrote that I got up seven in the morning I got my 8 year old boys awake. We left at 10:45 on our bikes and took BART to the East Bay. I showed them some geography from the train windows on the way. The boys wanted to know how long Caldicott Tunnel was.

At Pleasant Hill, we stopped at Starbucks on the way to Shell Ridge. The ride up the Ironhorse trail and Canal trail went quick. The grounds staff yelled at us in Diablo Hills Golf Course but we passed them easily. The boys complained at the crossing of near Muir Hospital. However, we managed to get past that as we entered the open spaces.

The first and second climb were hard. I had to fix one of the boys’ had to fix his derailers. I showed him how to do it. I probably should’ve taken his bike to the shop the week before. The third climb was really hard though. It was literally 500 feet. I had to help the boys with their bikes again.

We descended to Borges Ranch where I caught my breath. The boys drank water and had snack snacks. There was a Boy Scout troop from Lafayette. Their tents were in the Sun which I thought was funny. We climbed to Borges Vista then. We actually had to walk some of the way.

However, the boys were in good spirits. We headed on towards China Wall then. There weren't any names for the paths, but this one had a pond and was “the west route.“ I noted that there was a water tower near the top of that path.

We encountered a herd of cows. I asked them to get out of the way. After that, one of the boys abruptly got off his bike and freaked out a horse who had been following us. I tried to get the bikes above the trail, but that made the horse gallup away.

When we crested there, we only had one valley to go. I took a wrong turn and had to go back, but one of the boys bombed a hill at that point and it was really cool. We got to China Wall around 4 o’clock and I got photos of Mammoth rock.

We rode back much of the same route, but after the cows and water tank and pond we stayed on the western route to avoid Borges Ranch to save elevation and time. I noted that that meant we had to skip getting more water.

We descended to the trailhead but opted to go to downtown Walnut Creek instead. The view was great. We managed the traffic along Homestead and Lakewood well enough and stopped at a good but expensive taqueria Broadway.

 
This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.

The SNRR Crossing

On May 26, of 2025, I wrote that the day before I had gone swimming in Lake Natomas near Nimbus Dam on the way to our hotel in Rancho Cordova. We got up at 7:45 and I found that an old college roommate who lived nearby suggested I visit. So, we packed up and rode over the pedestrian crossing at highway 50 through White Rock community park and onward to his place.

He made us pancakes and coffee was good. He and his family live in a cute little house near the Jedidiah Bike Path. His kid has a lot of toys. The boys played with him outside. When we left the kids across the street we asked Hank to come out and play.

The boys lead the way to big Bend Park after we said goodbye. We got water at big Bend. When I got across the bridge, I lost one of the boys and we raced ahead to find him. Eventually, we found him at the next water station farther down the path. I was greatly relieved we had found him.

Later, the boys led the way again. We were running behind at that point but we stayed on the American RIver levees past Howe and onward to CSUS. There was no service to be found on campus so we continued over past the Expo Center and under the 160 highway crossing as well as the SNRR crossing. We also passed the Blue Diamond Plant. We had coffee at a coffee shop on seventh then right before boarding a train at 2:55. Everything turned out perfect. I noted that our next stop while I was writing was Richmond.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.

Jump in Lake Natomas

On May 25, of 2025, I wrote that I had gone to bed exhausted after the bike ride I had gone on with my 9 year old boys the day before in Browns Ravine at Folsom Lake. The boys got up around 8 o’clock in the morning in the hotel room I had gotten for us for the night in Folsom’s Historic District.

We checked out late and went looking for breakfast. The diner I liked no longer existed so we went to another place with long lines and high prices. When we were ready to go we rode the Natoma Trail. I made a video like I always do. The boys were really fast and they had no complaints. They chased each other, but eventually they were making each other nuts so I asked them to stop.

The bridges along Highway 50 had no jumpers. Normally 20 something year-old kids will hang out on the lake there to jump into the water 10 feet below. However, I did see a lot of bikes parked there. There were also a lot of electric bikes everywhere. I made the boys jump in Lake Natomas when we got to Nimbus Dam. While it wasn’t especially hot that day, the swimming area there is really great.

We rode to the fish hatchery and then we crossed over the Fair Oaks Bridge to visit the small town of Fair Oaks. I noted that the boys are a riot when they ride together. When we crossed back over the Fair Oaks Bridge headed to the Sunrise Bl Bike Path, the boys almost went the wrong way down the Jedidiah Smith trail because the path off makes a big clover leaf there.

As I had gotten a room for us on the far side of Highway 50, I was trying out the Sunrise Bike Path as a way to avoid extra work crossing big boulevards and it has the extra benefit of crossing under Highway 50 and passing near Sunrise Station.

Surprisingly, I found that the route is not only easier to use but it also goes through a group of hotels – two which had amenities comparable to I had booked for that night. I decided to keep it in mind for the next trip I made through the area.

While crossing Folsom Boulevard to Mercantile Road, we inadvertently passed the connection to the Folsom South Canal so we connected to it at Sunrise Bl. So, we were only on it for about a mile. I also missed getting a photo of that area. After that we connected to a neighborhood with a long and well made bike path called the Villages at Zinfandel on International Drive. That got us a stone’s throw from the hotel I had booked on Quality Drive.

We had stayed there a few times and liked the hotel a lot there but the place is literally a giant parking lot. When we had checked in, we did laundry and went swimming. I also found us a Chili’s and when we went back to the hotel, I got the boys mochi.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.

The Granite of Granite Bay

On May 24, of 2025, I wrote that we woke at 6:45 at a hotel in the Folsom Historic District and I was able to get my nine year old boys to organize by 7:45. We went downstairs and had fppd before riding over the rainbow bridge and up to Folsom Lake crossing by 9:30.

One of the boys was riding pretty slow but we took in the cool air on the way and got photos. The route I was counting on for accessing the lake shore no longer existed so we went to the next available access at Natoma Street. I noted that access to the lakeside was poorly maintained.

The boys and I looked at mafic stones there— it’s called La Colina Del Lago. The joint between the granite of Granite Bay and the Gabro pluton above New York Creek is right about at the reservoir’s main levee. I found levees four and five really interesting. The gravels, which were all likely brought into the area by truck had both granite and mafic rocks in it.

We followed some e-Bikes over to the lakeshore. I had taken a stop to catch my breath, so the boys got a little bit ahead of me and they were so fast that I thought I had lost them. We went to Folsom Point. The air was still cool there and the boys were skipping rocks. Levee Seven was undergoing construction, so the ride ended up being terrible through there. I couldn’t tell if we could get to Brown’s Ravine, but I used our binoculars and that helped.

Once we made it to the other end of Levee Seven we found a gate blocking access to Green Valley Boulevard near the Sophia Parkway entrance. However, getting into Brown’s Ravine turned out to actually be possible. We went halfway up the lake side to a couple of paths and I was able to find a route into Brown’s assembly.

From there we ascended a couple of other forest paths to Francisco Drive and took a break ata cafe. The boys were righty tired from all of this exertion. We stopped at the store before riding up Kingston Street to visit Lake Forest Elementary where we had ginger ale and visited the playground. Some kid on an E bike kept buzzing us.

From there we followed the path near Inverness and went to Wolf Creek Lane. We had to leave the Lake Forest area around Francisco Drive to enter an adjacent are called Lake Hills. Unfortunately we found gates and fences barring a connection to the “Equestrian Village” near at the end of Wolf Creek Lane. So, instead, we rode Lake Hills Dr to Carnelian where we rode up Norwich to look at a hole under a fence.

From there we climbed Sheffield to Francisco and descended to Guadalupe. We took in the view at Encina both north and south before taking Loma Verde to Lake Hills (we saw the fence with the hole again). We returned to Lake Forest Elementary to take Francisco back to Starbucks. We passed through Brown’s Assembly, but this time went to Lakeridge Oaks Drive and descended to Green Valley, past the fence at Sophia Parkway and along Levee Seven. The last climb was hard.

Once we had rested the ride resumed from Folsom Point to the Johnny Cash Trail. I noted that one of the boy’s bikes was having a chronic problem. The real rear derailer was hard to figure out. It had a lot of problems. However, we descended from there to the Folsom Historic District with no problems beside that. Once we had re-organized at our hotel room, we had some Pizza at Classico and headed to Fat Rabbit for dessert.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.