Haskell Cyn open space…

Yet another piece of land in Santa Clarita that has been made into Open Space for the public to use.  The 526 acres of Open Space can be used for walking, running or mountain biking. This trail head is off of Copper Hill and Near Haskell Canyon Road.

High above the homes in the area one has a great view of the entire Santa Clarita Valley. 

For the mountain biking I like the rolling terrain on the fire road. Very peaceful and wide open views. There is a tiny bit of single track but not much. This is mostly fire road up and down stuff.

Back in the day … “The Haskell family homesteaded this canyon for their cattle ranch in the early 1900’s.  Later, the Agajanian family raised hogs here until the 1950’s“. – credit to the hikesantaclarita.com website for this piece of history.

Trail ratings are gentle, moderate and steep as seen on the map legend below from the hikesantaclarita.com website.

Click to access Haskell_Canyon_Trail.pdf

 

 

 

 

 

 

Quigley Canyon

Nestled in the corner of Newhall near The Masters College and multi-use with the local horses is a “woodsy like” trail called Quigley Canyon Open Space. Yet another great open space trail in Santa Clarita.

It’s seldom I see more then one horse on the trail but when I do I give full courtesy to them as I don’t want to spoke the horses or the dogs.

There are two trail heads that you can come in from. One is off of Placerita Cyn Road with  Sierra Hwy being the cross street. The other entrance is near Master’s College. Quigley Cyn Rd. and Cleardale Street are the crossroads.

The trails are marked from easy to difficult.  Also if you follow the map (attached) you should be fine.

Click to access Quigley_Canyon_Trail.pdf

 

 

Tapia

Tapia is the local main mtb spot to go to in Santa Clarita. Many trails of all different levels. There are fire roads and single track. With such trail names as Charlie Canyon, Kona, Burn Victim, Junkyard, Wayside and Karl’s 2.0…There are many others. G – out is a popular one for the fast and furious!

There are a few ways into the Tapia area but the most common is from around the Castaic Animal Shelter. Either up Charlie Canyon or on the other side is Wayside. Do NOT take Tapia all the way up as at the bottom there is a home owner who is very much against mountain bikers and has been known to yell and scare people. I’ve heard of him following a first time female rider out the her car at the Castaic Sports Complex and yelling at her enough to scare her where she called the police. Be real careful on Tapia.

I’ve known a few riders who have hurt themselves deep in off the trails, so be sure to tell someone where you go each and every time you ride. Most of the time I’ve seen other riders in there.

Doing loops around the trails at Tapia is lot’s of fun. Give Tapia a try if you have not ridden there. It can be for a beginner rider to advanced.

View of some of the trails around Tapia

The famous phone at the towers.