Mountain Biking Bootleg Canyon Near Vegas

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

I've heard about Bootleg Canyon near Las Vegas a lot over the last few years. Many times it's because it's the the location for the Interbike Outdoor Demo. When I was in Vegas a couple weeks ago, I headed out to Bootleg Canyon one day for some great mountain biking.

Bootleg Canyon is at the edge of Boulder City. It's only a 30 minute drive from the Vegas strip. There's a sign where you turn off the main road at the Boulder City Taco Bell.

Yeti over at UpaDowna gave me the excellent suggestion of parking at the restrooms and doing a clockwise loop. His loop consisted of IMBA-Mother-West Leg-Caldera-Boy Scout-East Leg trails. I also threw in the POW trail and some side excursions.

In general as you go away from town you're climbing. Caldera slopes a little off the backside and there are views of the Vegas strip off in the distance. All that is needed to get around at Bootleg Canyon is to print out the map on the website. Most of the trail intersections are marked if one isn't marked you'll soon come to one that is.

The cross country trails have very little technical riding although they are rocky in a few sections. I didn't try any of the downhill trails but I've heard some of them are pretty gnarly. If you're in the Vegas area, you shouldn't miss mountain biking at Bootleg Canyon.

Brent Thomson, the guy that designed the great trails at Bootleg Canyon had a heart attack a few days before I rode there. You can read more and find information on donating for his medical bills on the Interbike blog.

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