The Ortega Highway, also known as California State Route 74, has long held a mystique for many motorcycle riders. And mostly lots of fear for me.
I mean, before I even hopped on a bike, all I heard was people die on that road. Especially motorcyclists. Then I took my California motorcycle safety class, and the instructor—a Marine, and concurrent instructor on the Camp Pendleton Naval Base—really drilled it in to us how dangerous Ortega can be. He gave us some personal stat, about how soldiers get back from a tour, have a good amount of money saved up, and want to get out some pent up energy. Often they turn to buying a brand new motorcycle, which they don’t have much experience riding. And then they head out to the majestic Ortega Hwy. And that’s where it all goes wrong.

Well I’ve been riding for 6+ years now. So I’m thinking maybe its time to get off the fence, and jump on the Ortega and see what its all about. After all, now that I run the West Coast arm of Jupiter’s Motorcycle Rentals, it would probably be a disservice not to know one of the supposed best rides around for motorcycle visitors, and motorcycle renters to the LA and Orange Couty area.

…but first I decided to pre-run it. I twisted my buddy’s arm, and on a beautiful warm Summer day (in the middle of our California Winter, just a couple weeks ago), we grabbed his car and took a ride on Ortega.
And you know what, I was pretty happily surprised. It wasn’t all the danger I had perceived it to be in my mind, after all these years of thinking on it as such a menace.

Now, you still gotta respect it. But that’s what I came back with: just like with any road, any ride—just like my Marine instructor taught us—you’ve gotta ride within your means.

So keep riding boys and girls. And enjoy the pictures of the pre-run. Because next time, it’ll be a lot less pictures, since I’ll be busy motorcycling it.

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