Santa Cruz Mountains Trail Stewardship Launches a New 'Out of the Ashes' Giveaway to Rebuild Fire-Ravaged State Park Trails

PRESS RELEASE: Mountain Bikers of Santa Cruz (MBOSC)

The trail stewardship will give away a custom-built Caletti Cycles bike with Raceface, Easton, or FOX components and locally-sourced coffee table from Kochlacs Wood to raise funds for much-needed trailwork throughout fire-ravaged CA State Parks.

Santa Cruz Mountains Trail Stewardship (SCMTS), a 501(c)(3) trail stewardship organization, today continued its popular “Out of the Ashes” fundraising campaign to raise funds for rehabilitation of trail networks affected by the recent CZU Lightning Complex Fires and give away a custom bike from Caletti Cycles and a one-of-a-kind live edge coffee table from Kochlacs Wood, in addition to bike components from Raceface/FOX/Easton. Drawing entries are $5 each, and all funds generated go straight into trails projects throughout California State Parks, including the historic Big Basin State Park that continues to experience wildfire damage. SCMTS has set a goal of raising $30,000 through this campaign, which ends on August 9 at 11:59 p.m. PT. Two grand prize winners will be selected on August 10. Interested parties can contribute to Out of the Ashes and earn a chance to win here.


The Santa Cruz Mountains are continuing to experience negative effects from last year’s CZU Lightning Complex Fires. Local parks were devastated during the CZU event, and the effort to rebuild historic parks like Big Basin, Butano, Año Nuevo, and Fall Creek State Parks will take thousands of hours of manual labor.

Last fall, SCMTS launched its first Out of the Ashes campaign in partnership with Ibis Cycles and Specialized Bicycles and raised $185,253.25 to cover the costs for SCMTS’ professional crew and volunteer coordination efforts to provide boots on the ground support where most needed. Thanks to generous donors who made that campaign a success, SCMTS and CA State Parks are nearly done rebuilding trails throughout Fall Creek State Park. The next push for the SCMTS Trail Crew is tackling the devastation in Big Basin and Butano State Parks, which are also the location of SCMTS’ annual gravel race, the Old Growth Classic.

Because of the wildfire’s severity, the path to public access in these much-loved parks is still murky. Public agencies need the support of the outdoor community now more than ever. Supporting Out of the Ashes isn’t just about winning a stellar prize; it’s a chance to make an impact on the restoration of these historic outdoor spaces. All contributions support ongoing trail clearing, trail reconstruction, erosion control, restoration, and the many other tasks needed to recover from fire damage. Funds will support SCMTS Trail Crew labor, construction materials, and volunteer coordination in the burn zone.


“Our Trail Crew has been out in the field alongside CA State Parks staff making progress on reopening trails, but there is still a tremendous amount of work to be done to restore areas within the burn zone to the point where public access can be reopened,” said Matt De Young, executive director of SCMTS. “As we began work out in Fall Creek State Park, it sank in that the post-fire rebuild effort will take thousands of hours of work over many years. We’re hopeful that we can build on the momentum of last year’s Out of the Ashes campaign and raise funds to support local land managers and restore our trails.”


For more information: Click here or email Katy Poniatowski at katy@santacruztrails.org

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