Aliso Creek Bikeway (south west)

In January, we rode the Aliso Creek Bikeway, starting at Muirlands and Los Alisos Blvd, heading towards Trabuco Canyon. Today we 'started' at the same point but rode towards Laguna Hills with the goal to get to Aliso and Wood Canyons Wilderness Park via the Aliso Creek Bikeway. In an effort to be “green”, we biked the extra miles from home to the Aliso Creek Bikeway instead of driving. Along with the extra miles and several unintentional hilly and off-road detours, I did not do a very good job measuring miles or jotting down good directions today.

If you are driving, park the car at El Toro Park (Jeronimo and Los Alisos Blvd) or street park along Los Alisos Blvd and Muirlands. The trail is well-marked, paved and appropriate for all ages of walkers, runners, skaters and bikers. The only ‘tricky’ parts are (1) when the path turns into a bike lane for a bit along Laguna Hills Drive and (2) that the trail marker is missing off of Laguna Hills Drive so take the off-shoot (south, under Laguna Hills Drive) to Sheep Hills Park which eventually turns back into the Aliso Creek Bikeway. The Bikeway will run to the entrance of the Aliso and Wood Canyons Wilderness Park.

I did not have any notable wildlife spottings or hitchhiking ticks today.

Aliso Creek Bikeway

The past few days have been gray, cold and wet but today there was a break between storms so we packed up our windbreakers and headed to the Aliso Creek Bikeway. This is a completely paved, fairly flat, multi-use trail. The final west part of the bikeway has not been completed yet but the plan is for the last section to end in Laguna Beach to create a “mountains to sea” bike path for Orange County.

We parked at El Toro Park (Muirlands and Los Alisos in Lake Forest) and rode east towards the mountains. The entire section we rode was about 8.5 miles one-way. The bike path ends at Cook’s Corner, a very hopping biker bar. Although the bar did advertise being kid friendly, the intersection was not very cyclist friendly and I was the recipient of “the bird” from, get this, a Prius.

The bike path follows Aliso Creek through neighborhoods and along busy roads that are not ever completely disguised by the groves of eucalyptus, sycamores and willows. Closer to the mountains, the marks of ‘civilization’ lessen and the landscape changed to sages, clumps of prickly pear and red-tailed hawks.

Today was cold and windy and the ride was uphill and against the wind but I really enjoyed riding this path.