Paige Meadows Hwy.89, West Shore, just South of the Tahoe City "Y" Paige Meadows has something for everyone (as far as Tahoe riding goes), dark forested trails, semi exposed trails, flat wide open meadows, big climbs, plenty of trails with little climbing, great descents, some technical via embedded and loose rock and you'll be riding a variety of fire roads... all the way down to narrow bar-end grabbing single track. There are a lot of trails in this area and in the meadow itself, a lot of them criss-cross each other but its all great riding and worth exploring.  Because of the multitude of trails we would suggest having a map of some sort, its easy to get turned around in there.  None the less, you're mostly surrounded by neighborhoods and Alpine Meadows ski resort so sooner or later you would find your way back to civilization.		Larry riding up Rawhide towards Paige Meadows

August 04, 2001 CoEd Ride, led by Sue of SASS (SAcramento Singletrack Scorchers)
First off let me say that Sue is a great ride leader so if you see any of her rides on our calendar you should GO!
Secondly... if you're a dirt girl you should be a member of SASS, a ladies MTB ride club.

WHERE:
We started at the Rawhide pavement/dirt junction.  Tahoe City, south on Hwy.89, right onto Granlibakken, left onto Rawhide and park at the end at the trail head.  If there is no parking left here you could either park at Cyclepaths, or somewhere off of Hwy.89, or instead of of turning left on Rawhide, you could continue forward to Granlibakken and find a parking spot there.
THE RIDE:
Climb up Rawhide Trail, 2nd right towards Rusty's Trail, left onto Rusty's, stay right and pass the TRT and then right onto Ward/Alpine fire road, left turn onto Scott Peak Trail (forest service road 48A) and climb to the Scott Peak ski patrol hut.  Drink your electrolytes, eat your carbs and take you pictures and then reverse the ride for a sweet descent back to Ward/Alpine fire road. At this point we continued back the way we came and investigated the various trails in Paige Meadows.  Eventually we returned back on Rawhide to our vehicles.
RIDE NOTES:
We had three cars and 8 riders with skill levels ranging from intermediate to advanced.  Great group, everyone knew what to do like, waiting for the rider behind them at intersections and selecting the right trails for the group as a whole.
None of us had been on this trail system before so our route was experimental but we did have a map from Cyclepaths which was pretty accurate.  Rawhide was a climb that started as a fire road and gradually turned singletrack, its soft in some spots at the start, has a beautiful 90deg. high banked berm and is a fun downhill at the end of the ride.  Rusty's Trail is sweet, one of those trails you wish would never end, skinny singletrack, lots of turns, relatively flat, and enough technical to keep you slightly busy.  Ward/Alpine fire road is pretty basic.  Climbing Scott Peak Trail is challenging for the intermediate and a decent workout for the advanced.  Scott Peak Trail has some loose spots, water bars (very nice jumps on the downhill), and near the top its gets a bit technical with a combination of loose stuff and rock outcroppings.  No matter what, the climb up Scott Peak Trail to Scott Peak is well worth the view!  We played around at the top for a while, there is a ski patrol hut that offers some great views.  Pete had found a empty beer can in the ski hut fridge and put on a great act convincing me it was a full cold one, everyone got a kick out of that including myself but I was disappointed :..(  After playing around there a bit we came back the same way, excellent slightly technical downhill with 5 large water bars near the bottom that you can "sky" on w/o even trying, the vertically challenged may want to brake heavy (no skidding!) and just soak those suckas up.  We backtracked to Paige Meadows where Sue and Julie went back to their car to attend a post ride engagement in Reno and the rest of us just randomly hit trails to see where they would go.  There are some interesting trails in the meadows that are built up with decorative brick to form a sidewalk like path, I guess that was to makeup for the eroded floor of the meadow (hard/dry cracked/bumpy).  About now we were either getting bored with searching for the perfect single track or physically spent from the ride and dinner was sounding real good so we descended Rawhide back to the cars.  Julie was there waiting for us because Sue took off to Reno to meet a hot date!  Julie was well prepared with a full-on picnic setup including an ice chest full of Gatoraid, juice and beer, thanks for the refreshments Julie!  We loaded up our vehicles, changed into our hippest post ride mountain biker garb and headed east on Hwy.28 towards Kings Beach for a great pasta dinner at Lanza's Italian Restaurant.  Our party of 7 had a 20 minute wait which isn't too bad considering this is Lake Tahoe at dinner time but it did give us a great excuse to go to Lanza's bar for some adult beverages.  For dinner we had 2 plates of pesto, 1 eggplant lasagna, 1 sampler, 1 spaghetti and by that time I was eating and lost track of what the others had.  After dinner we exchanged personal contact info and went our separate ways, overall a most excellent day!  I thank you all for your company and anytime you want ride again, just give me a shout!   -=Rory

3 Rides Courtesy of Cyclepaths.com
All three rides below start at Cyclepaths on the corner of Fir & Hwy.89 in Sunyside just south of Tahoe City.
We recommend this shop for its friendly, knowledgeable staff, $3.00 area topo maps and its bin of discount saddles :)

Paige Meadows Loop:
  Level: Novice/Intermediate
  Miles: 13
  Vertical Gain: 900'
Go 2 blocks south of the shop, turn right onto Pineland into Ward Canyon.  Up 3 miles, right on Chamonix to the end, right thru gate and up 0.8 miles on Ward/Alpine fire road.  At the "Y" turn right on Rusty's Trail, right at the end of Rusty's Trail, across creek to Rawhide and travel straight into Paige Meadows.  Follow elevated main trail across 1st meadow to 2nd meadow, bear left across meadow towards the woods.   Continue on singletrack to the "T" intersection with Paige jeep road, turn left then left again at the "Y" following jeep road towards Silver Tip, turn left right before Silver Tip (paved) onto singletrack and descend back to Rawhide Trail.  Go right on Rawhide Trail down to Rawhide Street (paved), right on Granlibakken Road, right onto bike path at Hwy.89 and follow back to the shop.

Scott Peak:
  Level: Advanced
  Miles: 22
  Vertical Gain: 2600'
Go 2 blocks south of the shop, turn right onto Pineland into Ward Canyon and ride all the way to the end, bear right onto the fire road under the chair lift and climb up into Sherwood Forest.  Go right at 2nd intersection and climb road towards top of Scott Peak Chair, turn right before the top onto singletrack and climb up towards Lakeview Patrol shack, turn left at the "T" intersection, descend singletrack to Ward/Alpine fire road and turn right, left on Rusty's Trail, straight onto Tahoe Rim Trail and descend to 64 Acres, right onto bike path at Hwy.89 and follow back to the shop.

Stanford Rock:
  Level: Advanced
  Miles: 14
  Vertical Gain: 3500'
Go south on the bike path 0.6 miles, just after crossing Ward Creek bridge turn right onto a singletrack and head up along the creek.  Go 0.1 miles to the next corner and turn left, go 0.1 miles to the "T" intersection and go right.  Follow trail all the way to the jeep road and climb all the way to the top (approx. 4mi. from last corner), always staying on the main trail.  On reaching the top, trail turns to singletrack and starts descending.  Upon T-ing into the Tahoe Rim Trail, make a sharp right and descend into Ward Canyon, cross the creek and continue on the TRT until you reach pavement (Ward Canyon Rd.).  At this point you have the choice of going right and descending on pavement back to Hwy.89 and the shop or crossing the road and continuing on the TRT up to Paige Meadows for some more riding.