Animal Chin through the Gauntlet of 10000 cone bike trails

[Terry Trimble]

I did some mileage the past 2 days, Monday I did 17 miles Monday.
I did 16 miles today in 2 hours 13 minutes non stop.

Now your all scratching your head asking what does the title have to with
long distance pumping and pushing skateboarding.

Let's start off with monday I woke up at 5:00 am and caught the 101 bus north to Oceanside to catch the Sprinter lite rail train to Escondido so I could see with my own eyes the east to west rail trail bike lane.
I found out the trail only went 6.66 miles and it stopped at Palomar College.
But what a Trail it is so fast and smooth I pumped the whole way hardly pushed at all it was like running 5860 slalom cones.

I pumped right by my old work and house when I lived in San Marcos.
I thought to my self damn why did they not have this trail when I lived their 20 years ago. Instead of road so ruff it would you would need a kidney belt on to skate it back in the day. I also would not have had to drive my car in to Escondido to slap curbs with my friends.

So the end of the trail came it was getting hot about 90 degrees so I waited at the Sprinter station to get to the coast quick were it was 15 degrees cooler. I could have skated down the bike lane in to Vista but it up and down lot of hills rough roads. I did not want to have a heart attack and die in Vista it the last town I want to die in is Vista it basically sucks if your from Vista in the surfing microcosm of North San Diego County.

So I get off the sprinter at Coast high way or it used to be Hill street in Oceanside. I have not street skated the sidewalks of Oceanside in almost
18 years. I forgot how messed up the sidewalk are they have been around since they first started making cement sidewalks.

I could have skated the bike lane but OPD has real strict skateboard laws in the business district.
So I took out 1 inch by 3/8 inch chunk out of my brand new Abec11 70mm Zig Zags I am really staring to hate Abec 11 all the wheels chuck up in less than a week.

So I get in To Carlsbad I was pissed off about my wheel. I skated the bike lane wow what a difference tax money makes on road conditions. In Carlsbad I start to Run the Cop Gauntlet I see 4 cop cars they paid no attention to me. I passed a Motorcycle cop with his visor up going up a hill parked between 2 cars with radar gun. I say "Hello" to Him and He said " Hello" also.
I thought to myself I passed the test long as I look like I am exercising they will leave me alone.
I get out of Carlsbad on the home stretch to Leucadia back on county roads that really suck because their so ruff I wish I had the kidney belt on. Note to self do not street skate north of Luecadia blvd. then I made it home 10.25 miles from Oceanside blvd. so that's how I hit 17 miles.

Animal Chin and running cones through the San Luis Rey river valley

Day 2 Tuesday I did the San Luis Rey River bike trail it is 8 miles out and back of pure fun smooth asphalt non stop because you pass under each road under a bridge by the river. I keep thinking of Chris Farley living in a van down by the river because I have read about homeless and migrants workers living in the river bed area.

About 2 mile if you look to your south you see the industrial area that has were Tracker Trucks and Transworld skateboarding magazine have been for about the past 20 years. Alot of history in this valley related to skateboarding as we know it. Plus some personal history for me also.

Mile 3 or so you come up on the secret field were The Powell Peralta Mega ramp was built by Tim Payne to Film In search of Animal Chin.
I went back then to watch them skate on the ramp after filming it was a awesome ramp that Tim Payne built back then. He gave Stacey the perfect canvas to show the greatest skaters on earth in action.

Then the Oceanside Drive in movie theater/swap meet I made out with a
so many chic's back in high school years I forgot their names it's a shame. It also known as the valley of death by my Samoan surfing buddies back then they beat up a lot of innocent drunk marines at the drive in's also. The irony of it all was 2 of them who beat up most of the marines up. Twin brothers were wrestling in their front yard at their house on Fousatt st. They landed wrong and killed his twin brother 10 years ago.

Back on the trail I notice a cement ditch fowling the trail that has sand in it need a fire hose to clear that sand out. I see a worker at school on the left riding a pallet jack like scooter through play ground. This guys needs a skateboard pallet jack are really heavy and fun to push around on loading docks.

At the Douglas dr. underpass if you get off and turn south you will be at
The Mission San Luis Rey that on El camino real. I went to Indian pow wow at the beginning of summer this year at the mission.
Pow wows are a lot of fun to go to.
Then I see it the sleeping indian mountain ridge that separates Fallbrook and Oceanside to the north east of the trail.

I was back in the old Stomping grounds of Jim Korten the best tight slalom racer in world even better than Bobby Percy according to Henry Hester.

I use to Hang out with Jim and His girlfriend Shirley and Jim taught me the magic of flying through slalom cones just below sleeping indian on a abandoned road . We would practice all kind of cone placements 6 foot offsets, 8 foots,4 foots and at the end he would throw in a few 3 foot straight just so I could plow them or get lucky and make it through them.
Then he would do it all on 1 foot so fast you that you knew he was slalom champ in era of no pro slalom racing.
I also drove chase car down sleeping indian rd. while he was on his luge board about 15 feet off his tail end at about 70 mph in some section. One wrong move on Jim's part and I would have run him over killed him.
But he would get mad if you did not follow close enough because he wanted to know how fast he was going.
I think he had a death wish he came up with the ill concieved solid 3/4 inch plate steel luge board that almost cost him his life in luge board race in Los angles area. He died on the table 3 times.
Jim became homeless and went to the Slalom worlds made it in to the top 10 at Morro bay a few years back.No one knew who he was except Henry Hester, Jack Smith , Steve Olson, Duane Peters and Hackett they knew what Jim was capable of on a Browed board.
I was thinking about that on the rest of the trip I come upon College ave end of the line a nice park on the south of the trail . I see another under pass they have added about 3/8th of mile of fresh smooth asphalt with yellow lines 8 feet apart. I did some slalom and thought to myself if Jim lived in this neighbor hood still he would be here everyday running cones on the 3/8th mile dead end. I wonder what under pass Jim lives under now.

I rested at the park for about 5 minutes and refilled my water bottle for the trip back to my car on the coast.
The trip back was a fun trip but I forgot about the head winds funneling down the San Luis Rey river valley from the Oceanside harbor beach .
So I did a lot of pushing I did it 16 miles in 2 hours and 13 minutes. Only 4140 slalom cones because of the head wind.

When I got back to my car I thought to myself this is my new/old stomping grounds again what a beautiful ride and view of the hills left untouched because of Camp Pendlton to the north. The avocado groves of Fallbrook to the east.

I also saw a sign that said the state is working on extending the trail all the way to the base of Palomar mountain area. It may take 20 more years but I hope I am skating on it because it will be one hell of a ride through the San Luis river valley.

Thanks for reading my story of adventure on the road of LDP and pushing skateboarding.
Terry

To check out the red trails for bicycle and man powered vehicles of San Diego California check out this link.
http://www.efgh.com/bike/redroute.htm