Oat Mountain might be the shortest gravel guide I’ll ever add and doesn’t really include dirt, but it’s still worthy inclusion on this list.
Part of the reason you think of fat tires when you think of this ride is how some of the worst mixed surface portions of the road are now beautifully paved, but the remaining pavement is still in bad enough shape that you’ll regret coming down these double digit grades on 25s.
While this may not satisfy your length requirement, it’s no easy task as there’s at least four significant stretches whereyou’ll be ascending in the high teens.
I always spend a lot more time there than I think, but I was surprised on this trip how much I’ve been missing just because I assumed this area would be as big as the other Nike Missle sites.
Boy, was I wrong.
The missle silos are big and scary in a way to think that this much firepower was situated on the Valley’s edge.
If you’re adventurous, remember to bring a flashlight to explore below as your phone won’t make a dent in these caverns.
The second big treat is the anomaly for beauty of this landscape.
Just below around Chatsworth and Santa Susana Pass, sits a collection of the rockiest outcroppings in the San Fernando Valley which makes the smooth blanketing of Oat Mountain a pleasant oddity.
This space is devoid of foliage except for these picturesque oaks that are perfectly placed.
The tease is all the other dirt roads you see in the periphery that are privately owned, but let’s hope that as oil production goes down that these lands become available.
You can add some of the other local roads to make a more robust ride, but I enjoy having short experiences like these that play bigger and you will too.
…find more Gravel Guides on our map here.