Reopening for Pleasure : Crystal Cove Park Back in Business Next Weekend

When the phone rings at Crystal Cove State Park these days, Ranger Mike Eaton has a pretty solid idea what the caller wants.

“They’re all looking to find out when the park is reopening,” Eaton said. “We’re getting dozens of phone calls every day.”

A mecca of mountain biking in Orange County, Crystal Cove will welcome back the public on July 1, six months after heavy winter rains gutted the 2,800-acre wilderness park.

First in line will be the mountain bikers, who love the park’s many steep hills, panoramic ocean views and cool marine breezes.

“This probably one of the best mountain bike areas in Southern California,” said Dave Mashaw, president of a local mountain bike club called SHARE. “It’s got the really tough climbs and it’s very hard to beat the view. When the evening is just right, you can see dolphins playing in the surf.”

In January, driving rains sent a torrent of water coursing through Deer Canyon, in the center of the park.

The normally quiet creek that feeds lush oak trees and other vegetation in the canyon was transformed into a raging river, carving out chasms up to 30 feet deep.

After the flood, “we were stunned by what we saw,” Mashaw said. “There were huge chunks of trail that weren’t there anymore.”

At least two of the canyon trails that suffered major damage will not be rebuilt. Instead, the park service intends to build bridges over the chasms, a project Eaton hopes will start by year’s end.

The floods were the second disaster to strike in two years, following the 1993 Laguna Beach fire that wiped out much of the park.

Eaton said the trees, brush and grass burned off by the fire hadn’t grown back fully, contributing to the damage caused by winter rains.

“The loss of vegetation after a fire increases runoff by a factor of 10,” Eaton said. “It becomes a one-two punch, fire and flood.”

Also on the agenda is the restoration of overnight campsites located about two miles inland, which were burned out by the Laguna fire.

“Very few people used them--they were really one of the best-kept secrets in the county,” said Eaton. “It’ll be good to see the campsites open again.”

The wet weather continued through the winter and spring, making any attempt to fix the damage treacherous for repair crews. The danger was experienced firsthand in February by a federal emergency worker out to assess the devastation, who broke his leg in the canyon and had to be rescued by helicopter.

SHARE members helped rebuild perimeter trails in April and participated in a few docent-led tours of the park last month. Finally, 80% of the trails were judged safe enough for the public and the park was allowed to reopen.

Eaton estimated that half a million people visited the park last year. Although most of them were mountain bikers, many hikers also enjoyed the park’s 18 miles of trails.

“People came up to me in the parking lot [at the Crystal Cove ranger station] constantly, wondering when the park would reopen to hiking,” said Arnie Guess, a park docent. “This is a special place. It’ll be nice to see it used again.”

But nobody has been straining at the leash more than the county’s mountain bikers, particularly the approximately 100 members of SHARE who originally formed to protect Crystal Cove Park.

“We’re very excited,” Mashaw said. “This is a uniquely wonderful place to bike.

“In the summertime, when you get extreme heat, those cool ocean breezes make it 15 degrees cooler here,” he said. “That’s good because climbing up hills gets very strenuous.

“People come here from all over, from Los Angeles and a lot from Long Beach. I’ve seen professional bikers from other countries.

“But mostly Crystal Cove is used by people from Orange County,” Mashaw said. “That’s who will be here July 1.”