TRIP 25 | Saturday-Sunday, September 21-22, 2013

Last Saturday Ryan was in Seattle for lawyer business and it looked like he would be here again this Saturday. On Thursday evening he emailed to say he didn't need to come but was thinking of coming anyway just to go on a ride on Saturday. I wrote him back and suggested that if he was willing to drive all the way from Boise to Lake Wenatchee to go on a one day ride, he might as well drive to Wallace and we could go riding there. He was game and so was Carolyn. I hoped Paul could come, too, but he was already booked for the weekend. On Friday after work Carolyn and I drove to Wallace. We arrived in Wallace around 11pm. Meanwhile, Ryan left Boise for Wallace on Friday night.

Carolyn painting the woodwork

I woke up Saturday morning at 4am with a headache. It hurt laying there so I got up and masked all the woodwork in the bathroom. In the morning Carolyn brushed on two coats of gloss white. Meanwhile, Ryan showed up around 8am, we prepped our gear, walked to the gas station and mixed up two tanks of two-stroke gas. Back at the house we filled up our motorcycles, put on our gear, and took off for the trails.

Summit of Bad Tom Mountain

We rode up Cranky Gulch to Trail 16 and then to the top of Bad Tom Mountain at 5,613'.

Ryan on Bad Tom looking down the ridge to Placer Peak

Ridge down to Slate Creek

Our next destination was Slate Creek. We planned to take a trail down this ridge before switchbacking down to the bottom of the valley beyond. When we went to get back on our bikes, I noticed my GPS was missing from its mount. I had a small chainsaw bungeed to the motorcycle's front forks and while coming up the rough trail, the bouncing saw must have knocked the GPS from its mount. Ryan and I rode slowly several miles back down Trail 16 to the top of the Cranky Gulch trail without finding the GPS. I didn't want to spend our precious riding hours looking for the GPS so we turned around and headed back up to Bad Tom Mountain.

Problems

Along the way Ryan's bike coughed and died. He thought he might have a fuel problem but when he disconnected the carb's fuel hose, free flowing gas poured out. Ryan quoted his grandpa, "Fuel and spark, that's all you need." In order to get to the spark plug we had to remove the seat and the tank. Even then, there wasn't room for the spark plug wrench. Ryan had to use a pair of needle nose pliers to loosen the spark plug. At the beginning of this riding season, he replaced the old spark plug with a new one. Fortunately, he kept the old plug in his tool bag. He replaced the spark plug with the old one, we put the bike back together and it started right up. From Bad Tom Mountain we rode several steep miles down 15 switchbacks to Slate Creek 2,300' below.

Upper Slate Creek trail

We rode about 4 miles along the banks of Slate Creek heading up-river. The trail was smooth and easy.

Checking our bearings

My GPS wasn't a catastrophic loss. I only use it for recording my tracks. For directions and maps I carry a Nexus 7 in my backpack. Its large screen, excellent mapping software (Backcountry Navigator), and the ability to easily zoom in or out and pan around, makes it far easier to use than my GPS. It also can record tracks and I used it the rest of the day to record our route. At this trail junction we continued on Upper Slate Creek trail, but would end up looping back down from Mastodon Mountain on the return trip on the Flume Creek trail to this point.

Trail junction

The Flume Creek trail comes in from the left, crossing Slate Creek. The Upper Slate Creek trail continues straight ahead and that's the route we took.

Crossing Slate Creek

A mile farther we reached the junction of the Dam Ridge Trail, 573. We rode across Slate Creek and headed up the trail.

Crossing Dam Creek

A quarter mile later we crossed Dam Creek.

Heading up the valley

While most of Dam Creek was contained within steep canyon walls, there were several places where the valley opened up. These parts were nice breaks from the concentration required riding on the canyon's side walls.

Ryan stuck on the slick rocks

We rode over some incredibly challenging obstacles all day, so it was surprising when we both got stuck on these relatively mild, but slick rocks. Ryan gunned his bike and pushed up and over the rocks. 

Giving me a hand

Ryan parked his bike and came back and pulled my front wheel up and over the obstacle. All morning we followed the fresh track of a bike with a rear trials tire. We never heard or saw the bike or rider.

Riding along the side hill with the open valley below

We rode several miles up this valley until it ended and we switched backed up the trail a couple of miles until we climbed out on a ridge.

The remains of the Mastodon Mountain lookout

From the ridge we rode a steep rocky trail up the shoulder of Mastodon Mountain to the summit at 5,905'.

The lookout back in its prime

The info I found for the Mastodon lookout reads, "Established as a camp in 1926, a shake cupola cabin was constructed in 1929. It was replaced in 1963 with a 10' concrete base topped by an R-6 flat cab was removed in 1978."

Tom and Ryan among the lookout's carnage

We had to make a decision how we'd get home. We could take the known and fairly easy ATV trail back to Striped Peak, but we'd be riding on exposed ridges for miles and miles. With the storm building behind us, that didn't seem to be such a safe route. On the other hand, taking our planned route down the Flume Creek singletrack might get us into something over our heads and we'd have to turn around. We decided to take the unknown Flume Creek trail back to Slate Creek.

Ryan trying to remove one of the guy wire anchors

Ryan looks like Buzz Aldrin collecting a soil sample on the moon.

View down Flume Creek

We'd end up dropping down into Flume Creek and riding out to Slate Creek in the far distance. 

Another view of Flume Creek

Riding down the Flume Creek trail

Back to Slate Creek

After descending down the Flume Creek canyon, the 5 mile trail took us back to Slate Creek. We crossed the creek and rode the trail back to the dirt road that took us back up to the Slate Creek Saddle. 

A recovery operation

From Slate Peak Saddle we had to decide whether to take the most direct way back to Wallace or ride up Trail 16 to Bad Tom Mountain again and go back down the way we came up, looking for my missing GPS. We saw no lightning nor heard any thunder so we took the trail up the ridge. We met an older gentleman looking off the trail down the mountainside. Next to him was a bent up ATV rack and a torn up Polaris seat. That's never a good sign. We stopped to see if he was ok and offer help. Here's the story. Last Saturday his 36 year old son was riding this man's ATV on this trail. One of the ATV's front tires hit the rock sticking out behind the man's feet and jerked the handlebars so the son steered off the mountain. The son bailed off the machine and the ATV tumbled out of sight down the mountain. The old man called his insurance company and they were prepared to helicopter out the wrecked machine, but the man's son wanted to try and recover the machine with a chainsaw winch. At that moment, the son was down the mountain somewhere, but we couldn't see him. Occasionally we'd hear the chainsaw. Even if they were able to winch the wreck, tree-by-tree, back onto the trail, how would they get the machine the several miles back to Slate Creek Saddle? Towing it with another ATV would be difficult. If the wheels are bent or missing, it would be nearly impossible.

The wrecked ATV is somewhere down there

We continued on Trail 16 and rode down Cranky Gulch trail looking for my GPS. Several times I thought I saw it on the trail, but each time it turned out to be bear scat. The trail is only 12 inches wide. If the GPS bounced even an inch off the trail into the brush, I'd never find it. I never found it. We parked our bikes at the house. That ride took us about 5 hours and we rode 47 miles and it was now 2pm. We then went with Carolyn to Angie's for meatball sandwiches.

Steep rocky trail

After lunch we poured the rest of the pre-mixed gas into our tanks and took off at 3pm. There was only enough gas to fill my tank about 4 inches from the top. We rode up to Slate Peak Saddle and then Trail 16 to the Slate Peak Divide. From there we rode the Cedar Mountain trail with the goal of reaching Arid Peak Lookout. John and I tried riding this trail last 4th of July, but we gave up because of a scary side hill and snow on Peak 6162.

Side hilling it

Last 4th of July and not knowing what was ahead and whether there'd be a spot to turn around, we parked our bikes here and walked this trail to find out what was ahead (snow). This time Ryan and I rode the trail and my eyes were zeroed in on the trail right in front of me. This was no place to mess up.
 
Inching along

Still not getting easier

Cresting Point 6162

When we explored this on the 4th of July, the trail here was still under 10' of snow.

Riding Slate Creek Divide

Now we're up on the ridge and following the contours of the mountain. 

Hey, look at that!

More ridge riding

Still on the ridge

Point 6183

Hmmm, this looks interesting. I hope I can squeeze around this. Remember that bike with the trials tire we had been following on this morning's ride? Well, we saw the same fresh track on this trail, too. In fact, while crossing these rocks, there was a fresh wet tire print on a flat rock. Who is this mysterious rider that always seems to be minutes ahead of us, yet never spotted?

Beautiful fall views at Point 5887

The trail is looking good

Eyes glued to the trail here

Throw in an obstacle ahead

It looks like my head (with the GoPro on top) is tilted slightly to the right. I must be tilting my head right to compensate for my body tilting left, trying to hug the mountain. At various trail junctions I'd check the maps and GPS on my Nexus 7 to choose the trail that would take us to Arid Peak Lookout. 

Arid Peak Lookout

Eventually we reached the lookout on an easy trail. Two summers ago, John, Eric, and I struggled on this trail, encountering one log after another. This time was a different story. There wasn't a single log and it was smooth riding. The skinny on the lookout is, "Arid Peak Lookout is a 1934 20' L-4, originally built to watch for fires from the Milwaukee Railroad as it came down Loop Creek from the Montana line to the North Fork of the St. Joe River near Avery, Idaho. In 1969 the legs of the tower were replaced, but the lookout was not used again. In 1996 and 1997, the Idaho Chapter of the FFLA and the St. Joe Ranger District joined in a restoration project; all of the beams atop the legs and underneath the cab were replaced, as were the stairs which had collapsed in 1970. The fully-restored lookout is now on the rental program, as it sits overlooking a companion project, "The Route of the Hiawatha", a rail-trail being developed over the trestles and through the tunnels of the abandoned Milwaukee line. The tower is on the National Historic Lookout Register." The lookout is available as an overnight rental for $25/night. There was no sign of anyone at the lookout, such as a stove, a backpack, or a drying coat. I called up to the lookout and asked if anyone was there. No one answered. 

View inside the lookout

I climbed up the stairs and looked in the window. Clearly there were guests. I wonder where they were?

Needs a fresh coat of paint

Trail to water

I wandered around the perimeter and spotted a trail to water. Perhaps the renters were down the mountain collecting water.

Ryan resting at Arid Peak

1910 railroad trestle

We rode 3 miles from the Arid Peak Lookout to a dirt access road. There we saw the renter's car where they backpacked to the lookout from. We headed down the road to the North Fork of the St. Joe River (between Ryan and the trestle). We rode to Pearson and then on the old Milwaukee railroad through a couple of tunnels until we were up on the trestle in this photo. By this time the sun was starting to go down, even earlier in these deep canyons. We had 21 miles to ride over Moon Pass to get back to Wallace. It started to get cold. I bet those folks at Arid Peak Lookout were thinking their sleeping bags were mighty thin once the sun went down. I considered taking Ryan on a more exciting route home rather than the boring dirt road, but I talked myself out of it.

Almost on fumes

We arrived home at 7pm with the sun just going down behind the mountains. When I opened my gas cap to pour in Sta-bil in the tank for the winter, I was surprised to see I only had a few tablespoons of gas remaining in the tank. Good thing we didn't take any side trips home or we would have been stranded.

Morning ride in red. Afternoon ride in blue.

Our afternoon ride was 50 miles. We rode just under a hundred miles today, most of it singletrack. We were riding for about 9 hours, coming back to Wallace in between rides for fuel and food. We took showers, cleaned up, and the three of us went out to dinner. I was so sleepy I could barely talk. After dinner Ryan loaded up his bike and headed off for the long drive back to Boise. He stays awake on Pepsi and dill-flavored sun flower seeds.

On Sunday morning we went to church. It was the Wallace branch's Branch Conference. The chapel was packed with various folks from the stake in Hayden Lake. After church we went on a walk and checked on John's house. We stuck around until 5pm and headed home, late enough to miss the traffic over Snoqualmie Pass. It was pouring rain over the pass and driving that section was scarier than any of the motorcycling riding we did on Saturday. It was a quick and short trip to Wallace this weekend, but we made the most of it by riding all day on Saturday. The Forest Service booklet I have is called, "Ultimate Motorcycle Loops of the St. Joe River Country." We only rode a few of the trails out of 28 pages of trails (many trails listed per page). We need to go back and ride some more.

TRIP 24 | Wednesday-Monday, August 28-September 2, 2013

I left a little early from work on Wednesday because the pass was scheduled to be closed for blasting all evening. Carolyn, Gypsy and I were soon on our way to Wallace. Traffic over the pass was horrendous has usual. We crossed eastern Washington to Idaho and stopped in Coeur d'Alene for petrol and a late dinner at Cafe Rio. We arrived in Wallace an hour later and unpacked the car. Meanwhile, John and Natalie landed in Spokane and drove a rental car to Wallace. We wished our kids could have come to Wallace for Labor Day, but they're spread out all over the world this weekend. Allison and Tate are in Las Vegas for her sister-in-law's wedding. Eric and Tanya are in Ft. Lauderdale on a six month assignment for work. Paige, Chris, Fox, and Jane are in Budapest, Hungary on a quick weekend tour from Germany.

Heading down Granite Gulch

On Thursday morning I finished tiling the upstairs bathroom floor. Then Carolyn and I went on an ATV ride with Carol, the key organizer of ATV Week and a local resident. She felt bad I had to trail drag a couple of rides during July's ATV Week and missed the rides I originally signed up for. In July she said if we came to Wallace over Labor Day she'd take us on a good ride. It wasn't just an empty promise because the night before I received an email from her that asked if we were in Wallace yet and if so, did we want to go on an exciting ride? Carolyn made arrangements for us to meet her at her house in Woodland Park. Carol took us up to the substation past Burke and then climbed to the ridge to Granite Peak and then dropped down the other side through Granite Gulch.

Old mine adit

We passed several old mine adits.

Heading down to an old miner's cabin

Carol and Carolyn

We flipped a uey just above the cabin to look at another adit. We'd continue to drop down Granite Gulch (behind Carol) until we popped out above Murray, ID.

Checking out the cabin

Home sweet home

Carol said the cabin has been here since the 1800's. That seems hard to believe since nature recycles everything so quickly in this environment, but I suppose it's possible.

Dovetail construction

The cabin was certainly built with precision and skill.

Another adit farther down the mountain

An old stamp mill

Carol is telling us about an old stamp mill at the bottom of the mountain.

45 mile loop

When we exited Granite Gulch we rode back over Kings Pass, up Dudley Creek to Dobson Pass, and back down to Wallace.

Trail 16 from Slate Creek Saddle to Moon Peak

We weren't back home long before John called and wanted to go on a motorcycle ride. We took off up Placer Creek and to Slate Creek Saddle. From there we took a singletrack I've never been on before.

This is fun!

Looking out over Slate Creek

Here comes John

Singletrack to new places is my favorite kind of riding. John's not a big fan but he rode the trail perfectly.

Still fun

The trail eventually intersected the road from Moon Pass along the Slate Creek Divide. From there we headed down Moon Pass Road and explored a two-track that took us to the back slopes of Stevens Peak.

Mountains and mountains

From the backside of Stevens Peak we rode up a steep trail that took us to the summit of Gold Hill.

Another marker

I mentioned in a previous report that just about every summit we've visited has one or more homebrew memorials. Gold Hill was no different.

Heading back on the ridge trail

GPS track of the ride

Our ride was about 29 miles long. Back home I walked to the hardware store to get a 25 lb bag of white grout. They were all out. That night John and Natalie drove to Spokane to pick up Daniel at the airport. They stopped at a Home Depot on the way and got me two 10 lb boxes of grout. They left the boxes on our front porch at midnight so we could start grouting the walls and floor of the bathroom first thing Friday morning. Meanwhile, my parents were driving to Wallace from Provo. They stopped this evening for the night in Butte, MT. On Friday morning, Carolyn I grouted the walls (hard - fighting gravity) and then the floor (easy). Around noon my parents arrived. Carolyn made us some tacos and then we headed up to John's house.

Daniel crossing Grouse Gulch Creek

Later Friday afternoon John and Daniel loaded their bikes on their trailer and I led them on my motorcycle over to a trail system off of Canyon Creek in Burke Canyon. So far Daniel has been mostly riding on smooth railroad trails. This afternoon we planned to up the difficulty a notch. Daniel did great.

Steep wash-out

We rode from Wallace high along the slopes of the mountains that border I-90. When we got close to Mullan we started down a steep trail that only got steeper and more rutted. John and Daniel stopped and I continued riding down until I found a road that would take us the rest of the way to Mullan. I rode back up and parked here while John and Daniel worked their way down the trail.

John and Daniel way down there

Steep gets steeper

Daniel heading down the trail

We popped out at the Morning mine and followed a dirt road to the town of Mullan.

Riding through Mullan

Bitterroot Cafe

Our destination was the Bitterroot Cafe. All of us stopped here last Thanksgiving for breakfast, but the place was closed and out of business. On one of the rides during ATV week we rode by the cafe and I saw it was re-opened. Even though it was 4pm and we were all going out to dinner in a couple of hours, we went inside the Bitterroot and John bought us three glasses of milk and a giant cinnamon roll we split three ways. It hit the spot.

GPS track of 28 mile ride to Mullan and back

We exited Mullan a different way so we could avoid the treacherous hill we came down. We made it back just in time to get cleaned up and meet at the City Limits Pub for dinner. Afterwards we went up to John's house to watch a movie.

Repairs on Bad Tom Mountain

On Saturday morning I worked on cutting and applying bead board to the bathroom walls. Today was the start of the three day Under the Freeway Flea Market event. Carolyn and I walked over to the market to see what kind of junk was for sale. We were both interested in looking at different things and I was in a hurry to get back and go on a ride with John, so we split up. Carolyn got sidetracked looking at an old album of photos and postcards. She even found some from Lake Wenatchee. I zipped through all the stalls and at the last one, bought a box of loose electronic tubes (332 of them, to be exact) for $20. At another booth I found two Weller 225w soldering guns for $3 each (both work perfectly). I carried my loot home, John called and we headed off on a ride. We rode up to Slate Creek Saddle and up trail 16 to Bad Tom Mountain. This morning John had installed a fan kit on his motorcycle and when we stopped, I noticed a bolt was working its way out from under the tank. He stopped and fixed it. From here there's a steep singletrack trail that heads down to the bottom of Slate Creek. The map showed a small trail to a viewpoint if we headed down the trail part way to Slate Creek.

Trail 16 to Bad Tom Mountain

While John was fixing his bike, I snapped this photo of the trail we had ridden up. When John's bike was fixed we took off down another trail toward Slate Creek. We rode a mile or two. I obviously missed the turnoff to the viewpoint. At the point we stopped we could see the trail switchbacked steeply down to Slate Creek. I was tempted to continue down the trail. This is the stuff I enjoy the most. We decided, though, to turn back before we got ourselves into something over our heads.

Hiking up to the viewpoint

We back tracked and found the trail to the viewpoint. The reason we missed it was the trail has been decommissioned with an "Experimental Forest" sign and a bunch of sticks and logs tossed over the trail for the first quarter mile. John is a good sport to indulge my side trips and we hiked about a half mile to point 5376 where we had a great view of the upper Slate Creek area.

Flume Creek left, Dam Creek center, Slate Creek right

All of these valleys and ridge tops have singletrack motorcycle trails.

GPS track of the ride

While we were at the viewpoint we could hear some motorcycles coming up the distant trail from Slate Creek. By the time we hiked back to our motorcycles, we found our bikes surrounded by a dozen guys on KTM's (and one girl on a KLX140L, like Daniel's). They were from the Tri-Cities area and had staged from Avery. They were heading to Wallace for burgers and milkshakes. I asked which way they were headed and they planned to ride down Cranky Gulch. I've ridden up Cranky Gulch but never down it. I wanted to ride down Cranky Gulch, too, because it was the fastest way to get back to town. We waited for the KTM crew to head off and the dust settle and then John and I took off. We rode down the Cranky Gulch singletrack and John did great. He has his bike dialed in and we've done a lot of riding this summer and his skills and confidence have soared. The blue track in the upper left was our hike out to the knob's viewpoint. The red track directly below that was our adventure halfway down to Slate Creek.

When we got home I continued working on the bead board. John and Daniel loaded their bikes on the trailer, came over, and I led them to Osburn. We planned to ride up to Polaris Peak, the site of an old lookout. We unloaded the bikes and Daniel noticed his front brake didn't work. Pulling the brake lever did nothing. What could have happened to it? We thought that bleeding the front brake might restore brake function, but we had no wrench small enough to open the bleed valve. I rode Daniel's bike, sans front brake, down to Osburn's main street to see if I could purchase a wrench. All I found open was a drug store and fortunately they sold a tiny adjustable crescent wrench. I rode back to where we parked and we tried bleeding the front brake. It worked for a moment, but then all of a sudden the brake wouldn't hold the pressure and would stop working, even though the brake reservoir had plenty of fluid. Eventually we gave up, loaded the bikes on the trailer, and took them to my house where we could work on Daniel's bike with more tools. We didn't make any progress and had to throw in the towel and admit we weren't going on another ride. John got on the internet and on the phone to the Kawasaki dealer in Bellevue. They told him the warranty on the bike is only 6 months. Unfortunately, the closest Kawasaki dealer is in Spokane. Then I remembered the independent mechanic in Cataldo who fixed my KDX last summer for a good price. John called him and made arrangements to take Daniel's bike there on Monday. I'll pick up the bike the next time we come out to Wallace.

On Saturday night we all met at John's house for pizza. We were planning on watching a movie but we sat around the table talking so long that the movie didn't happen. On Sunday we went to church. Late that afternoon we went to John's for a late brunch. John, Natalie, and Daniel made apple and blueberry waffles and bacon. It was really good. After dinner John took Daniel practice driving. Daniel has his learners permit and he got to drive up the canyon past Burke and on the dirt road all the way to Cooper's Pass high on the Montana border, probably 50 miles round trip. That beats driving around a residential neighborhood any day. Sunday night around 8:30pm, everyone came over to our house and Carolyn made tacos. Carolyn makes delicious slow cooked pulled chicken and slow cooked pulled pork cooked in Dr. Pepper. We sat around the table talking until 10:30 and then everyone headed home.

Work in progress

On Monday morning I finished the bead board, bottom molding, and top cap. I applied two coats of tile sealer to the walls and the floor. Then I caulked the various joints in the bead board footers and headers. The bathroom is ready for paint.

Another view

The bathroom had a built-in medicine cabinet, but it was off-center from the sink because of the studs behind the wall. I removed the cabinet and patched the wall with a new piece of drywall, visible in this photo before we paint the walls.

Mom and dad heading home

Wallace was packed this three day weekend with a lot of visitors and touristas. Perhaps it's a sign of an improved economy. John, Natalie, and Daniel had to head to the Spokane airport mid-afternoon for their flight home. My parents needed to take off around the same time for their drive back to Utah. My parents invited us all out to lunch as a final send off. We planned to eat at the Red Light Garage, but they told us it'd be a one hour wait. Instead, we ate at the Smokehouse BBQ, one of my favorite restaurants in town. Afterwards, my parents left for the first leg of their journey to Butte. John, Natalie, and Daniel left for Spokane. Carolyn and I stuck around until 5pm, spraying the lawn and washing the ATVs before putting them away for the winter. We kept looking at the online traffic situation over Snoqualmie Pass. Traffic was horrible and delayed an hour or two. Our plan was to hit the pass around 10pm, hopefully after the pass cleared up. If it was still jammed, we'd turn off at the Columbia River and spend the night at the cabin and head home early Tuesday morning. When we reached the Columbia, the online traffic map showed no slowdowns so we continued on and made it home at 10:30 that night. We had a great Labor Day weekend.