Black Tech Loop route

Beginning at the Link River TH, follow the gravel Link River trail briefly, then take a right and climb up Sawmill trail with the Link River falling away to your left. Continue on Sawmill across the sagebrush/juniper flat that offers excellent views of the Upper Klamath Lake to the north. Sawmill drops elevation after clearing the top and offers a short section of flow before the climb begins in earnest. You’ll hit the pavement and pass a trail map, where the trail spits you out straight onto the pavement and through a row of traffic bollards. Continue up the pavement until it bends around to the right, where after the near U-turn, Hayride trail ascends off the left side of the pavement. Climb up Hayride, now venturing into an open ponderosa pine hillside, and passing disc golf goals on the way. You’ll encounter a straight section and a wooden bridge, where you finally receive a respite from the climb. Shortly after the trail flattens out here, you’ll come to a disc golf tee pad and spot a 90 degree turn to the left, which you will make and climb straight up the fall line for a short bit, until you cross Klamath Ridgeview trail and head up 5 Gallon. After crossing KRVT and starting up 5 Gallon, you’ll reach a junction of basically 5 trails, turn left here and point straight up the hill. 5 Gallon continues straight up the hillside from the riders perspective, immediately banking right in a somewhat bermed corner from the junction. Follow 5 Gallon through three switchbacks until you reach a split with a trail marker, that if turning left would take you down Big Sky trail. You will continue along 5 Gallon to the right here, where it climbs for roughly 30 yards directly up the fall line prior to angling left and flattening out prior to turning right up the hill at a fork in the trail. Continue upwards along 5 Gallon, where you will emerge into some more open, rocky, sagebrush terrain. Expect to see some deer along this stretch in the mornings and evenings. You finish your ascent of mid-5 Gallon when you reach a ‘Y’ in the trail, where you’ll go to the right and climb a short, mellow section of middle Whiskeytown rated before again arriving at a junction to make a 90 degree left onto Lakeview trail, for more climbing. Follow Lakeview up 4 switchbacks before traversing across the hillside with the Upper Klamath Lake often viewable in front of you on the right. You will cross a fall line trail (more of a gash) that is 911, continue straight across on Lakeview. You’ll get a brief respite from climbing with a very brief bit of downhill that carries you quite nicely into some punchy, rock-strewn climbing to wrap up this part of the route. Don’t touch the brakes here and your momentum will save you a bit of effort After some soft s-turns to finish Lakeview, continue upwards across a little bit of rocky terrain and take a right onto Hot Lava, which immediately offers some rocky squeezes to maneuver. Hot Lava continues up the ridgeline and offers views towards Upper Klamath Lake, south towards Mt. Shasta (viewable on a clear day), and affords a peek at the top of Moore Mountain, with her antennas and power transformers as a mark. You will encounter one split in the trail on Hot Lava, after a spicy little rocky left hander and roll, you’ll want to stay left. You’ve completed Hot Lava when you reach a large opening with the remnants of an old access road on your left, Buzzard trail heading around the front of the mountain towards the lake to your right, and a wide, flat trail going off straight ahead into some brush, aptly named Tunnel of Love as the brush does create a tunnel-like feel. This will be the second to last climbing leg, so follow it straight. Tunnel of Love is an old road, so it’s pretty flat and wide, you can relax and pedal pretty leisurely on this one. It does steepen at the end, after crossing a couple trail intersections (first, Enduro; and second, Tank). The intersection of TOL and Tank begins this increase in grade, where the doubletrack curves left and climbs up to a couple can’t-miss landmarks: two old, rusted out “junker” trucks with an amalgamation of stickers pasted onto them. This, as one would expect, marks the beginning of Junker trail, and the effective end of your sustained climb to the top of Moore Mountain. Junker goes the riders left behind the two junkers, and features plenty of spicy rock features to keep your interest in the first half of this trail. Eventually you’ll emerge into some terrain with less trees and more of the tall brush, where you come across a 5-way trail junction, Junker continues straight here, and begins to descend a little more. Finishing Junker, you’ll arrive back on Tunnel of Love, where you’ll take a right and after reaching the open flat, continue into Hot Lava in the reverse direction of earlier. Reach the spot where you joined Hot Lava off of Lakeview trail, and this time continue straight on Hot Lava (don’t go right here, towards the power station). In 10-15 yards, angle to the right (left takes you back to Lakeview trail) and you are now effectively riding on Ridge trail. Ridge, as it’s name suggests, meanders along the ridge and features a bunch of punchy short rocky sections, both small climbs and technical descents. You’ll come across three wooden crosses at the top of one such brief climb, and this offers spectacular views south into California and Mt. Shasta, as well as North over the Upper Klamath Lake and to the peaks that surround Crater Lake Nat’l Park. Continue straight on Ridge, mostly downhill now, but just as spicy, until you make a tight left-hander around the front side of the ridge. Shortly after, you will cross one trail meeting Ridge, a green trail called Linda’s. At this point you will continue straight on what is now Boom trail, downhill until you reach a triangular 3-way intersection. Here you’ll turn left onto what is actually upper 5 Gallon, for a little bit of rocky descent and some cross country traversing that takes you north in the direction of the lake until you encounter the first intersection, where if you were to go straight, you’d continue down the part of 5 Gallon that you climbed up earlier. Here we will turn right on Whiskeytown, the most exciting downhill on this route. Riding down Whiskeytown due East, you’ll hit a bermed right hander, followed by a left and a sizable rock jump to flat that is a blast to hit. Continue straight down Whiskeytown after remain straight where Cutter branches off to the right. Here, Whiskeytown plunges downhill into some steep rock drops and catch berms, culminating in a tight left handed that leads into three optional little jumps along the left side of the trail. At this point it’s fast flow down to an intersection amongst the sage again, where we will hang a right onto Blueberry trail for a brief easy climb to our final couple techy, XC type of trails: T-Bag, Ratcamp, and Sidewinder. At the junction of Blueberry, Cutter, Sunrise, Southie, and T-Bar (each are marked), you will turn left and angle a little to the north starting onto T-Bar and then quickly taking your first left, T-Bag. T-Bag, like the next two trails, is winding and has all kinds of challenging rock features. Finishing T-Bag, you’ll cross Eulalona (gravel doubletrack) and continue straight and leftmost, into the narrow opening of Ratcamp. This trail is similarly winding with plenty of rocks to keep you interested, and is peppered with more trees and roots, and softer dirt. After completion of Ratcamp, continue straight across Sawmill and start onto Sidewinder, which offers more of the same, plus some short sections of punchy, technical climbs. Once you’ve seemingly traveled all the way out to the point of the ridge, it bends back southbound and you will angle left onto Powerline trail. This is a pretty easy smooth ride after all those rocks. Powerline will finally bring you to your final intersection, where you’ll take a hard almost 180 left hand turn to join Sawmill and enjoy a flowy, fun for all skill levels, descent back down to the river and parking area!