RamaJon's van sat parked near the Cottonwood skate park, tucked in the shade. As I approached, I spotted him inside a colorful, neat space splashed with fun wall art. A gorgeous green mountain bike—impressive and spotless—leaned against the van wall as his constant companion. I've known Rama for decades, since 1989 when he ran Sedona's first mountain biking shop. Over the years, he's become a cult figure in the scene: part guru for his inclusive Sunday rides welcoming all, part living archive of local trails, and part legend for that notorious Grand Canyon descent—high on mushrooms with four companions, ending in arrests, a helicopter evacuation, and eternal fame as the Sedona 5. He also wrote The Rise Of the Gnarly Crew, packed with colorful tales of his adventures and the rotating cast of characters around him. At 70, he's still at it, working at a bike shop in Old Town Cottonwood.
I wondered what those famous Sunday weekly rides were like, so I asked around. Maybe I was feeling left out.
Cindy Morrow, one of Sedona's first mountain bikers, described them: "Chaotic. Haphazard. Exhilarating. There never seems to be a plan or a leader. They generally take off in a basic direction, but might veer another way at any time. It's like a flock of birds that have flown together so long they barely need to speak to know when to turn—and when they do speak, they have colorful names for trails that barely exist. They communicate on the fly, seemingly in their own improvised language. One minute you're on a maintained trail, the next you're barreling down a rocky, steep wash with no idea what's coming up. There is a lot of stopping to wait and get high, of course! And then a mad dash off again."
Simon Bosman adds, “The early-day rides were an all-day event, where camaraderie and adventure were the focus. The rides now are generally shorter, with a fast pace and are technically challenging. We now spend much of the ride now actually riding. We all push one another.”
Trail builder Bounder weighed in. “The majority of riders are dysfunctional, enjoy riding off trail and in washes, and in the early days the group was mainly strong riders who left lesser skilled riders in the dust. The non-pot heads need to tolerate many ‘safety breaks.’ All riders are invited to do Sunday rides. Whether they enjoy the ride and come back for another is a good question—many don’t.”
I start to get the feeling the ride itself is kind of a process of elimiation game. Ride with us if you dare.
Before the interview, we chatted and shared a bit of that popular natural herbal relaxant. No reason not to enjoy the process. Once that was out of the way, Rama dove right in. What he shared brought my earlier talks with Simon and Incognito into sharper focus, giving me a wider view of Sedona’s riders, trails, and how they evolved.
He started out by remarking that the whole trail building scene changed when new builders came to town with a different style and skills to build trails."Incognito and Bounder came to town and trails started getting built. Their arrival marked a shift. Before that, we followed the Rama approach: just ride. You can't cross-country very far in Sedona without stumbling onto some kind of trail. We'd ride where the bikes took us, over and over, linking old cattle trails, Indian paths, cowboy routes, deer runs, even javelina tracks. Those early explorations became the network—the system trails, official now and adopted by the Forest Service."
There was a congenial vibe out on the trails, he remembers. "Horse people contributed too we'd spot them marking lines, stop to chit-chat, then we would follow. Their early trails wove into the network." Everything changed when Incognito, Bounder, and Leonardo, the mysterious artistic solo builder of Hangover, showed up.
"What occurred was that we had ridden in the low-hanging fruit—things that you could just ride in, you know, it was always law that you could travel cross country in Sedona, that was legal. So we never broke a single law. And we didn't move a rock or break a branch to make a trail. We were obeying the law—we were very proud of that." Rama laughs out loud. "Maybe the only law that we ever obeyed."
There were two distinct groups of mountain bikers/explorers. The earlier bikers just rode everywhere, creating trails as they rode, always on the hunt for a new and exciting line and a way to get from point A to point B. But there was another group who showed up about 25-30 years ago and these trail builders were different.
"These guys had visions, much deeper, because they were builders—they were crafting the Earth to build these trails. That wasn't our bag; we weren't into that. We were going to ride what was there in front of us. And we were pretty unstoppable, you know, but they wanted trails.
"We had always ribbed California people because they wanted to ride without getting off their bikes, and that was Bounder, right? If there was any obstacle when he was behind the group, he was making it no longer an obstacle. And there were certain bypass routes that he made that were—I mean, great routes—and now at 70 years old, I ride all of his bypass routes and love him for it."
Rama chuckles at the memory. "But back in the day, he was like the scourge of the world, you know, making all of the trails easier, making bypasses so you didn't have to do the hard stuff. Having to not get off your bike on every ride. So, you know, his trails were crafted—I mean, visionary stuff. He did more actual physical building than Incognito, who was kind of a route picker.
" 'Nito did very little work, you know? He was closer to our philosophy, right? Because all of Incognito's trails were so good that they just got ridden in, you know, and that's how we made trails—we just rode them in."
I asked Rama more about the relationship between the Forest Service and the mountain bikers before Jennifer Burns came on the job.
Rama was irritated that the Forest Service billed for trails they'd essentially created, with no credit or compensation. "They didn't have to do much work for it but still billed full per-mile pay. We were the ones who should've gotten paid—we rode those trails in.
"I'll be honest, I tried to avoid the Forest Service at every moment. We all applied for permits for tours; we were all turned down. And so, you know, in my opinion there was no reason to interact with them. They weren't willing to give me a permit so that I could make a living, like the Jeep tour people."
This mirrors my own experience applying for a hiking guide permit years ago. With two decades of guiding under my belt, I had waited years for permit applications to open, paid the $250 fee just to apply, lined up a million dollars in required insurance, requested just 3-4 trails and got denied flat-out. I didnt want a big business. I just wanted to peacefully and legally share a few trails I loved with visitors. No dice.
I get Rama's bitterness completely—despite following every rule, some of us less conventional locals who love the land still get treated like outsiders. I'm not surprised he didn't want much to do with the Forest Service after the rejection.
Lost in my reverie, Rama continued: "Whenever they offered programs to help with trails, we all went to them for a few weeks until they screwed us and then we'd all leave and go on our merry way. Happened over and over again, at least a dozen times, before Jennifer even showed up."
I didn't understand what he meant, so I asked him to clarify.
"Yeah," he said. "They'd find out where the trails are and they'd ruin them or close them."
Again and in every interview so far, Jennifer Burns coming on the scene changed the dynamic of the Forest Service's relationship to the mountain bikers and the trail system.
By mutual agreement, we leave the Forest Service behind and wrap up with the beauty and flow of mountain biking.
"I'm more of a Daoist, right? I watch everything. I pick and choose what I do from what I see. I try not to create any value judgments on most words and actions—it's just your path. I watch the flow and try to stay in the flow.
"That's kind of what mountain biking is—what life is all about. Every action we take in this lifetime is spiritual action. One of my teachers would say dharma is karma is dharma is karma. So your actions become your spiritual activity. That's how my life has been. Biking is the flow."
Rama drops his voice. "When you're focused on riding and you're not looking up, just looking at the trail, you can forget where the hell you are. As long as you don't look up, you could be anywhere in the country you've ridden. Wow, I love that experience."
