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Sedona - 16 hr drive from Austin


throet
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https://goo.gl/maps/ArLGgbEFr352

https://www.mtbproject.com/directory/8011366/sedona

 

"There's a lot of stuff in Sedona that is seriously high consequence with little room for error and not super obvious lines. I'd consider getting a guide or hooking up with a local for some of the bigger / more difficult stuff, if only just to follow lines through the slickrock and drops. If you ride do by yourself, it'd be a really good idea to at least have some type of tracker app on when you're out on the bigger trails. It can get real real quick. Pads and sticky-sole shoes (i.e. not had plastic XC shoes) are a good idea too. FWIW I like the stuff on the south and west side of town most. Triple H is your best bet for a mega loop that takes in most of the best hard stuff in one go.

For bikes, I would really consider renting a bigger bike than an XC rig if you truly want to try to ride everything and have fun doing it. I'm not a more-is-better kinda guy when it comes to travel, but there were definitely times on a 120mm rig that I truly felt outgunned in various spots. 140+ on a 29 or 160ish on a 27.5 is the sweet spot I think. Over the Edge, Bike and Bean, and Absolute Bikes are all good shops to rent from.


Sedona miles are hard miles, especially this time of year. Kinda like BCBG back trails on steroids - they feel relentless with the technical ups and downs. I'm sure you're a very fit rider, but just know that doing something like Triple H is going to take pretty much anyone all day without mishaps (especially in the heat) and leave you totally gassed. Just plan accordingly, and take lots of food/water. There's not much shade.

Anything that's under the radar out there is typically very hush-hush and VERY high consequence." ~ DSC

    

 
 
"I happened to do 7 straight days in
Sedona in March. Tried to cover all the classics and catch a bunch of the other "really interesting" stuff too. Several pretty big rides and a few shuttles that may or may not make sense for you, but should give you some ideas at least.

Every day was awesome in its own way:

https://www.strava.com/activities/885634707
https://www.strava.com/activities/886549364
https://www.strava.com/activities/887908524
https://www.strava.com/activities/889400821
https://www.strava.com/activities/890394375
https://www.strava.com/activities/891672755
https://www.strava.com/activities/892729318

Also, for Arizona in general and Sedona in particular, Trailforks will show significantly more trails than mtbproject and will likely guide you through the maze better if you really want to explore. That's because Trailforks allows unfiltered user-generated uploads, while mtbproject's trails are subject to approval by IMBA moderators, and while lots of Sedona's maze has gone legal, there's still a bunch of weird stuff on the ground out there, so... Trailforks FTW." ~ FoldsInHalf

 

 

"Airport loop- Not a double black but definitely a black. nice little decent then Grueling Baby head ridden 400 foot climb. Kinda like riding through TC with smoother rocks but up hill. Then you get to the exposure around the Mesa and it is suhweet. find the loop on MTB project.

Brewer DH to Adobe Jack area. We rode this once for recon and once with the family. I prefer to ride up Grand Central and ride down everything else. Adobe Jack and Javalina. Make sure you go up to the top of the rock while climbing up.

https://www.strava.com/activities/1086536038

Bandit to Old post loop to Cathedral rock tour, including slim shady, Made in the shade, Hiline. You can refill with water at the end of slim shady, then take made in the shade up to hiline. My advice if you do this loop is to not take old post trail back up this climb sucks. Instead ride Herkenham and Skywalker. Skywalker is great and reminds me a lot of Flat rock ranch at times. There is good pizza and gelato near the end of this ride at Pisa Lisa!
https://www.strava.com/activities/1088599321

Bell rock tour with Family. Probably the only beginner friendly trail in Sedona.

Brewer DH over to Hangover and back for a lap of Airport. ~18 mi
Probably the craziest ride I have ever been on. It didn't help that My XTR pedal broke as soon as I got to Hangover. This is the only place I wanted A tire other than a bald Ikon 2.35. It can be a Hike-a-bike in a few select spots if you don't want to risk death. I rode some insanely exposed lines at times and in a few spots my wife was the voice of reason. BTW did I mention she was on a 90/90mm bike? When you are coming down off the backside on "lower Hangover", this is the only part of trail where I really wanted a bigger bike or a guide. A guide to show you where to roll the lines would have been almost more beneficial than a 150mm bike. You are busy looking for white dots and get to the drops with no speed. I walked a few 5' drops and took a B line option on some others. Its just bare rock so you can go where you want. drops are pictured 30 second into this video

Lower Hangover, Sedona Arizona
Check out his other video of the upper ridge which is exposed but 100% rideable. Its the climb up and over the top which gets interesting in spots.
This trail ends with a sweet flowy downhill

https://www.strava.com/activities/1091809698

Bandit-Skywalker, to other XC trails. There were three really nice steady downhills trails in this loop. This was a cool ride we took a wrong turn and headed up a greenbeltesque steep climb into a neighborhood near the end before the street. We also tried to use trail forks to connect into Chimney rock loop, but it is now a welded shut fence on private property. You can see the trail from the road but the land grab has blocked access to an actual Major park. https://www.strava.com/activities/1093408674

Again rode this loop twice in one day. It was so fun, I went back with other family. Chimney rock loop, Thunder (take the new bypass) Teacup, soldier pass to the giant Sinkhole, Jordan, Javelina
I was just cruising along on a flat spot on Thunder and gashed the hell out of my Ikon. It was a fluke and I still cant believe it happened. The ground looked like plain walking path.

https://www.strava.com/activities/1094926075

I hope this helps. We are definitely going back." ~ FJSnoozer

 

 

"Good suggestions all around. The signage is pretty good in Sedona, but I'd also recommend downloading the region on Trailforks and MTBProject so you have them available offline. It will definitely make navigation easier in some of the trickier areas.

In addition to FJsnoozer's recs, you may check out the Mezcal / Chuckwagon / Aerie area. Good trails that are more on the mild side with a few exciting sections, but really good riding overall. That's in NW
Sedona.

+1 on the Cathedral Rock Big Loop (as named on MTBProject), sounds right up your alley. Templeton is all ridable is you're a baller, but the only part you'll probably have to walk are the switchbacks going down to the creek. Watch for hikers on the tech downhill sections. The Baldwin section is good CCW, but flows well either way. On the way back I would suggest taking Easy Breezy, but then take a right on HT for a short bit and connect back up with Slim Shady and take it all the way back. Hermit Trail, which is the alternative, kinda sucks. That'll all make sense when you're looking at a map.

The Hogs system is a good if you want more technical riding, but not as high consequence as Hangover. A good route through there is Slim Shady-HT-Little Horse-Broken Arrow-High on the Hog-Hog Heaven-Pigtail (if you want a flow trail)-Twin Buttes. From there you can either retrace your steps on HT/Slim Shady, ride Bell Rock path back, or take the road. Again, it'll all make sense if you're looking at one of the map apps." ~ DSC

 

 

"1) We hit Flagstaff on the way into Sedona. Highly recommend. We rode the Shulz creek area. Up engineers dogfood, across on Secret, BLAST back down on Shulz Creek. (these names are on Trailforks.) Not steep, but a very steady, asskicking 1300 foot/5 mile climb up engineers dogfood. DECENT IS WORTH IT.

2) Trailforks is AWESOME. Find a segment you are interested in, click on ridelog to find rides that included your segment of interest. boom, route is all ready for you. you can also create routes on the PC/web version but I found it to not work very well.

3) Hogs area was badass! Hog heaven, high on the hog, broken arrow, pigtail, hogwash, peccary, subamarine rock... were all fun, scenic trails. High on the hog rivaled hiline for technical difficulty, awesome trail! one of my favorites.

4) In the northwest area, people recommended Chuckwagon and Mezcal. Mezcal was nice but chuckwagon was overrated, imo. I will skip this entire corner if I come back. Other stuff in the area had equally good vistas and this area had lots of meh sections (compared with the rest of
Sedona, of course)

5) Slim shady to hiline to baldwin to templeton and back was the bomb. hiline had the adrenaline and stoke rev'ed up to 11. I loved the exposure but not everyone does and there is plenty of it on hiline. Hiline also has a few really technical downhill sections. We walked a couple. no big deal. Still worth doing. DO HILINE.

We skipped hangover since a lot of the locals said that it was neat but that they don't do it on any regular basis.

It was hotter than I anticipated in mid-October out there." ~ Anita Handle

Edited by throet
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  • 1 year later...
On 9/17/2020 at 5:43 PM, hurronnicane said:

Does anyone have a favorite campsite in or near Sedona?   Our group will include tents, vans and truck campers.  We won’t all have 4wd either...

Leave town on 89a going west, in about 10 miles take a right on FR525, stay right at the fork and then just drive in a few miles and find a empty lot. It's all BLM land out there so no services, but it's also free and beautiful.

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