TR - Orogenesis 2024

Wrightwood and Angelus Natl Forest, day 5


After Skyline I headed over toward Wrightwood and camped at Blue Ridge with a plan to explore a couple spots.


Did a bit of driving around. Views were great as always

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/01.jpg


Found a few new to me dispersed campsites. The first scouting over here didn't pan out. I was looking at whether it would be feasible to build a connector trail from the end of one singletrack to bypass a section of shitty fire road. But the terrain there is far too rocky and cliff like.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/02.jpg


I headed over by Lake Hughes in the Angeles National Forest next. A bit of a hike but I needed to get groceries and gas in town, so it worked out.


We'd found on maps a short singletrack that would bypass some paved road between Boquet Reservoir and Green Valley. It showed a bit of heatmap activity so it was time to check it out.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/03.jpg


It looked promising at the top, but soon got heavily rutted. Fortunately the ruts only lasted 200ft or so until the grade mellowed out.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/04.jpg


Then it was ok for a while in the middle. Brushy in spots but mostly ok, and only one spot with poison oak

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/05.jpg


One last section with some ruts

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/06.jpg


The lower part passed through a disc golf course, which I wasn't expecting. But it had shaded picnic tables at the parking area so that is a bonus. Plus a bikes allowed sign. This one will take a bit of hike a bike either direction with the ruts and steeps. But the road is still there if people prefer.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/07.jpg


Just on the other side of Green Valley is a short ATV / moto trail I wanted to check out again. I'd ridden it years ago and didn't remember liking it much. But I think it had just been graded at the time to ATV width.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/08.jpg


It seemed a lot nicer this time with big oaks for some shade and a stream running in the meadow below

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/09.jpg

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/10.jpg


Did it as an out and back, and ran into this guy on the way back

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/11.jpg


While I do like the trail now, not sure on using it for the route. At the south end it turns and runs parallel to the highway for 1/4 mile away from town. Which means we'd have to pedal an extra 1/4 mile back on San Francisquito Canyon Rd which has no shoulder and heavy commuter traffic. The section of forest road this trail bypasses is nice enough I don't see a need to add half mile of extra riding. But if we could dig a short MTB connector from the road to the trail before it turns, that could be the answer here.


Made good use of groceries when I found camp. This will do for three dinners so it's worth the effort.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/12.jpg


Uninvited guest. There were a few of these guys hanging out below the picnic table.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...couting/13.jpg

San Gabriel Mtns, Day 6


The schedule worked out so I was able to join the Lowelifes for a trail day to help open up the Rim Trail near the top of Mt Wilson. It has been closed since the Bobcat fire in 2020.

They've had a number of trail days on it already and it is close to being ready to be re-opened.


Well above the marine layer which was blanketing LA

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/01.jpg


We had a 3 mile ride in. Great to be back on this trail!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/02.jpg


Even having been worked on it is still raw and challenging, which sharp switchbacks, narrow trail and tons of exposure

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/03.jpg


As with most fires not everything burned so it is still plenty green

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/04.jpg


Did I mention narrow trail? Got a little too close to the edge here and a rock that had been part of the tread decided it would rather relocate down the hill. Almost took me with it

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/05.jpg


I was assigned a brush cutter with metal blades and got to work. Before:

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/06.jpg


After:

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/07.jpg


We had to brush the corridor before another crew could come in and work the tread. That'll probably happen on a different day

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/08.jpg


I was able to clear the worst of it, about 300 yards from the trail's end at Newcomb's Pass back to where the other crew had finished tread

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/09.jpg


Cleaning up post work. There was a lot of poison oak in this area. I'd been wearing a bug head net since the deer flies were out and killing us. I think it stopped a lot of PO fragments from hitting my face.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/10.jpg


They had a couple vehicles drive in to ferry out tools. I caught a ride back. But the connector still needs a bit of work

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/11.jpg


Carnitas tacos back at the trailhead. Always a good time with this crew! As a bonus, the Forest Service reduced the closure area the day after this work was done so Rim Trail is now open to the public again.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/12.jpg

San Gabriels, still day 6


The trail party ended about 5pm. With 3+ more hours of light I headed down the mountain a bit to check out some other trails on my to-do list.

There are a few connector trails in these mountains that don't see a ton of use, but are important if you want to put together big rides.


We had used one of these on the Escape LA bikepack. I didn't really like that connector because it requires almost a mile on Angeles Forest Highway (also known as the Angeles Forest 500 race track on weekends). In other words, not a very safe road for bikes. So I had suggested a different trail for Orogenesis which required no pavement. It's not the most bike friendly singletrack though. I'd noticed on Escape LA that there could be a third option. So the plan was to hike both and see which one was better.


Orogenesis goes this way. Starts off nice and it was partially cleared as part of a fuel reduction project.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/13.jpg


It gets pretty rocky. Fun if you're going downhill. Not so much going up. And that's the direction the majority of Orogenesis thru traffic will likely go.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/14.jpg


And there are half dozen switchbacks like this. With exposed stakes to add penalty for failure

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/15.jpg


The new option I'd found looks more like this, with wider sweeping turns. It has enough rock to keep it interesting but not to make it unrideable in either direction. This route is a winner. I passed it on to Escape LA management as well.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/16.jpg


The only bummer was a fuel management project at the top of the trail that completely hid the singletrack. It'll eventually get cleaned up. Free firewood if you need any!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/17.jpg


All of these options connect right over to the intersection of Angeles Forest Highway and Angeles Crest Hwy (Hwy 2). Though this section also disappears into the wreckage of another fuel reduction project closer to the intersection.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/18.jpg


Nice sunset incoming

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...lifesTW/19.jpg

San Gabriel Mtns, day 7. Mid June


Chilao and Mt Hillyer is another riding area in the San Gabriels, and it is also part of the Orogenesis route. I hadn't ridden there in years so like other places it was time to give it another go.


After the prior day's scouting I headed up Pacifico Mtn from Mill Creek Summit to camp. The road to Pacifico had been closed for a few years, and from what I'd heard the tacoma bros and #vanlifers hadn't found out about it opening yet. There is a small campground at the top. Maybe 4 sites?

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/01.jpg


I had got up top pretty late. It was windy but not terrible. But around 2am the wind kicked up big time. I had to put the roof top tent down as the whole truck was getting rocked. I had specifically built my camper out with a cabinet flush with my fridge so that I could use it as a sleeping platform. Perfect for when you're stealth camping in town, or when it's too windy to use the tent.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/02.jpg


After breakfast I headed down the mountain and parked at Charlton Flat day use. Then started pedaling towards Mt Hillyer. For an area so close to LA this network does not see a ton of bike traffic. (It helps that Hwy 2 is frequently closed making it harder to get here)

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/03.jpg


Snow plant in bloom

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/04.jpg


I made the climb up the Chilao-Hillyer fire road. That's Pacifico Mtn where I'd camped on the left

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/05.jpg


Not often you get critters to stand there and pose for you

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/06.jpg


Mt Hillyer is a fun trail with some nice rock features. Seems like this is the only trail that sees much traffic

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/07.jpg


At the bottom I turned left and climbed up Silver Moccasin Trail.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/08.jpg


From a high point the trail parallels the paved portion of Santa Clara Divide Rd to the Three Points trailhead. This section seems to be getting no traffic at all. Kind of mind boggling. It needs a bit of work to get it riding well. It's a sweet trail when it is, mostly contouring with good views and just short descents and climbs.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/09.jpg


It has some nice chunky sections as well. Following this is the only part of the trail needing serious work, with a big rut down the trail for 50 yards where water is not draining off.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/10.jpg


From Three Points I pedaled the road back to the high point and then dropped back onto Silver Moc. As you head south on this trail it drops about 1500ft with a few climbs along the way. The singletrack is a point to point that can be looped using a few different roads, or as a pretty tough out and back

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/11.jpg


Singletrack on one of the climbs

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/12.jpg


The north and south parts of the trail are connected by this mile long doubletrack. It's pretty scenic with a stream crossing in the middle

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/13.jpg


I had checked out the southernmost section of Silver Moc to Hwy 2 a couple months before.

This time I wanted to climb up Vetter Mtn. There used to be a trail off the top of it. On the road climb up I noticed one section of that trail seemed to be open. Not in great shape, but it had been fully brushed. No sign of recent traffic. The upper part was still clogged with thick brush

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/14.jpg


View near the top was not bad

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/15.jpg


Nice shade structure and picnic area up top.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/16.jpg


Vetter Mtn Fire lookout. It burned in the 2009 Station Fire and was re-built in 2020.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/17.jpg


Hung out for the light to get good but had a ways to go back to the truck. It was mostly downhill then a 500ft climb back up. Just made it without needing lights.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0.../Chilao/18.jpg


I've now ridden all the trail in the Chilao area. It's a tough push heading north. But most riders of Orogenesis will be heading south. I was pretty happy with the overall condition of the trails. They're kind of raw and backcountry feeling. Need to ride here more often!

San Gabriel Mtns, day 8. Still mid June.


Also on my to-do list was to return to the mining road near Mt Gleason and continue opening it up to allow bike passage. I had worked on it with Lowelifes the previous summer and then spent a couple days earlier this year working on it.


With some heat, the brush was growing back fast and there were a bunch of new trees down

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iningRd/01.jpg


I rode up from Mill Creek summit and brought the chainsaw to make brushing go faster. The downed log you can see in the background is where I left off last time. Need a real chainsaw to clear that one. For now, it's possible to go under it (without a bike)

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iningRd/02.jpg


Came across another big downed tree over the old road bed. It's a solid 4-footer so I decided it would be easiest to go around the butt on the left.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iningRd/03.jpg


Gas chainsaws will make quick work of small downed trees so I left them in place and focused on brush. Looking ahead.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iningRd/04.jpg


And looking back. This whole section was super thick with cyanothus and other brush so I didn't clear much distance. But it was satisfying work.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iningRd/05.jpg


Nice view on the pedal out.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iningRd/06.jpg

San Gabriel Mtns, day 9, still mid June


Throughout Orogenesis there are tons of choices to be made on which way to go, with each option having pros and cons. One of those is whether to take Grizzly Flat Trail or Stone Canyon Trail to connect from Big Tujunga Canyon Road to Angeles Crest Hwy. Stone Canyon is a 3,100ft climb and then you descend 5 mile on forest road to where Grizzly Flat tops out. Grizzly Flat is only a 1,500ft climb, but it is not well maintained and has five stream crossings that can run deep and fast. I tried to do this loop last year and turned back at the second crossing. Too deep.

Stone Canyon was all but gone until a few years ago when a Lowelife and another local re-opened it top to bottom. While brushing made it passable, it was still an adventure ride as the trail was steep and very exposed, and the tread not in great shape. It was included in Escape from LA bikepacking route last fall and we found that the lower half of the trail had re-built tread. Today's ride was to see if more work had been done, as I suspected the trail gnomes would keep working their way uphill.


I started at the bottom of Grizzly Flat at Vogel Flat and made my way through the canyon to the bottom of Stone Canyon

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/01.jpg


It's not idea to go barefoot as these trailheads are party spots with plenty of broken glass. I brought an old pair of shoes for the crossing then changed into riding shows. Only one crossing on Stone, right at the bottom.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/02.jpg


The recent trail work already growing back in

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/03.jpg


I rode parts, walked parts.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/04.jpg


This was one of the sketchy switchbacks before. Still requires dismount but no longer sketchy

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/05.jpg


Mid way up to the climb I ran into the other local who has been working on the trail. He was finishing up a small re-route that would be the last project on the trail. He said he has worked on this trail on and off since the 80s and this was the second full re-build of it.


Higher up I came across some more re-routing, all of it pro level construction done to forest service spec. All of this new work was fully rideable uphill. It bypasses a steep fall line section that had developed after past fires. These switchbacks were apparently the original alignment.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/06.jpg


More new switchbacks. The existing line drops down on the right and continues behind me

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/07.jpg


Big Tujunga road way down there in the canyon. You can also see Condor Peak Trail winding up the mountains on the opposite side. Condor Peak is the distinctive hump just left of center.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/08.jpg


The fire road dropping off Mt Lukens is primitive in spots. Not bad as far as fire roads go

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/09.jpg


When I rode Grizzly a few years back it had just been cleaned up and was riding well. But it was reportedly in bad shape again. The start was fine

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/10.jpg


Nice view down to the canyon

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/11.jpg


It was definitely overgrown in places with plenty of poison oak. But only a couple of downed trees. There is a half mile section before the creek crossings that is steep, loose and rutted. Fun on a day ride but it would be a handful while bikepacking

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/12.jpg


First of five crossings. This was the deepest one and I stopped for a swim here.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/13.jpg


The trail was hard to follow within the riparian areas. Grizzly doesn't see much use

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/14.jpg


Once out of the riparian areas it was fine, but still primitive

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/15.jpg


Fourth crossing. This was the one I turned around at last time. It was a lot deeper than this.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Grizzly/16.jpg


Flow is determined by release of water from Big Tujunga dam, not by rainfall, so you can't predict it ahead of time. For that reason, and knowing that Stone Canyon is now completely re-built, I'm going to have the route go up Stone rather than Grizzly. Stone is an extra 1,500ft but with the better tread condition is about equal effort.

I took advantage of prime fall temps and just finished another extended scouting trip up the west side of the Sierra. The mission was to check out areas that burned in the last few years that are now open again, to look for solutions to a few problem spots, and to check out some new route alternatives in others.


My first stop was Wrightwood. On the last trip in June I was looking at a bypass for Lone Pine Canyon Road (posts #23-25 on last page). And I found a good one, except for one spot that had a heinous hike a bike that is a deal killer for that part section. I needed to find another ending.

There is an area on the other side of Hwy 2 that I previously dismissed since it is a large wash, but now wanted to check it out for anything passable. It would be easy to just hop on Hwy 2 for a mile and a half but that section has some curves and zero shoulder along with heavy traffic, so that's a no-go.


I parked at the south end just outside Swarthout Canyon near Wrightwood and headed north on a doubletrack. It gets very faint on satellite and disappears. It's always different on the ground.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/01.jpg


I checked out a couple turns that lead into the Sheep Creek wash but they both seemed to dead end - couldn't see any continuing trail across the wash. A doubletrack to the right kept going though.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/02.jpg


It got narrower, rockier and more overgrown the further it went to the point it was almost unrideable. Not ideal. And it ended in the wash here with a steep bank on one side and a hike a bike over to the distant water tank to the left.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/03.jpg


There was no trail up on the bank so I went over to the water tank which has road access from the other direction. That road lead to an OHV road a bit north which goes where I need to go, but has some super steep, rutted sections. The climb was bad enough....(it was steeper than it looks here)

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/04.jpg


The descent down the other side was total BS. Even steeper but with lots of loose rock and sand. Not good.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/05.jpg


That's too bad because it turns into nice singletrack after that. At some point we may be able to build a singletrack bypass to the steep part.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/06.jpg


Continuing on, I got to another road which I hoped would cut off a big chunk of Hwy 2 but it was gated and signed no trespassing. Time to turn around. On the way back I found a short trail along Hwy 2 that can be used. But that section of Hwy 2 has a good shoulder so it's probably simpler to just stay on the road.


More importantly, I went back to the water tank and found a doubletrack heading south that looked like it might connect to one of the first two options I'd looked at that dead-ended.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/07.jpg


From this side I was able to find where vehicles were crossing the wash, and it connects in at another faint side trail I hadn't spotted before. Not great, but worst case it is possible to just push across the wash if it's obliterated by storms. It roughly runs beneath a powerline that can be used as a guide. It's only 600ft or so across the wash.

For now I'll recommend we use route across the wash, and connect to Hwy 2 just beyond the water tank. This bypasses the worst 1.5 miles of Hwy 2 and leaves 2mi of riding on Hwy 2 to Hwy 138. It would be possible to cut off another mile using the steep ridgeline section, but that last 2 miles of Hwy 2 has decent shoulder and visibility. As a bonus for going this way, there is an urbam trail all the way through Wrightwood on the south side of Hwy 2 that will get riders off pavement there and take them right to all the services in town.



It was dark when I finished but I had one more stop to make, to check out a trail that recently popped up on Trailforks near Cajon Pass. It connects to the route pretty well and cuts off a section through a residential area that I'd like to avoid.

The trail heads down a narrow ridge with some steep sections and jumps. It will be be a bit tough for bikepacking, but it is pretty fun. Probably easier during the day....

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/08.jpg

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/09.jpg


And there is an easy fire road bypass for anyone heading north who wants to avoid some hike a bike. Ran into a local:

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ghtwood/10.jpg


I'll be recommending both of these sections for the route. Productive evening! This completes the bypass of Lone Pine Canyon Road with mostly dirt, and a decent amount of singletrack. Win.

The next stop was Kernville for a quick morning ride before it got hot.

Currently the main route uses Dutch Flat Trail to drop down to Keyesville. I'm not a fan of Dutch Flat except in winter/spring when the dirt has moisture. It sees a lot of uphill moto traffic from Keyesville so it gets torn up by mid summer with big ruts and loose sand. It can be a miserable descent in those conditions.

The route I want to use there follows Kern Canyon Trail to Badger Flat and Rancheria Road. The trails are mostly good xc riding, but this route also adds a lot of mileage without a lot of available water. It's good headed south which trends downhill. I wanted to find an alternate uphill route for people heading north. There are a few dirt / OHV roads in the area that head uphill from Keyesville so I set up a self shuttle for one called Hogeye that looked the most promising.


Looking down at Lake Isabella from the start of the ride

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/01.jpg


The start of my ride was on Granite Trail, which connects Sawmill Road to the start of Dutch Flat.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/02.jpg


There are some nice granite slabs and singletrack before the route kicks steeply uphill for a bit.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/03.jpg


Another cool feature

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/04.jpg


When I got to Dutch Flat I turned right to climb rather than left to drop down to Keyesville. Most riders don't go this way. It started off mellow but soon got steeper with some hike a bike

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/05.jpg


Then it teed into a jeep road and things got serious (steep)

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/06.jpg


Looking back. The road climbed about 600ft here, with most of that in two steep pitches.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/07.jpg


At the top I turned left onto what was labelled as jeep trail on my map but signed as singletrack on the ground. It was sort of singletrack.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/08.jpg


This is what singletrack becomes when it's steep enough. The riding was still fun up to this point. Maybe not so much on a loaded bikepacking rig.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/09.jpg


Eventually the rolling terrain ended and the trail turned straight downhill. Not sure what it was supposed to be called at this point but it was road width and so steep it became a slide fest that wasn't fun anymore.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/10.jpg


Then it got even steeper. My feet couldn't even maintain a grip, I was just sliding down and trying to use the bike as a 3rd leg. Had to go off trail to the side where dirt was softer and bushes offered some support. It's a lot steeper than it looks

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/11.jpg


Looking back up

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/12.jpg


I salvaged the ride with a bit of nice singletrack back to the truck at Keyesville. Doesn't need to be said but we will not be using Hogeye for the route : )

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tHogeye/13.jpg

Labor Day weekend

After the Kernville ride I continued north to the Greenhorn Mtns above Kernville to meet up with Kern River Valley MTB and the Lowelifes for a trailwork campout at Frog Meadow and some trailwork on Tobias Trail. It burned in 2021 in the Windy fire and is in bad shape. I hiked it last year around this time and found it overgrown with many downed trees, and hard to follow in places. We were going to take a good shot at getting it rideable again.


Brent's pups helped get the equipment ready

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iasWork/01.jpg


A couple of us were put on hedger duty, a couple brush saws, a couple chainsaw crews, and a crew to clean up the tread

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iasWork/02.jpg


Nice that the ferns came back thick!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iasWork/03.jpg


Lots of debris to clear off the trail too

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iasWork/04.jpg


Starting to look like a trail again

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iasWork/05.jpg


Some parts were rake n ride

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iasWork/06.jpg


Brush was really thick in other parts

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iasWork/07.jpg


In two days we were able to get about 90% of the trail open, just one short section lower down still needs work!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...iasWork/08.jpg

The plan for Labor Day Monday was to ride! Most took off to do a shuttle on Cannell Trail. Jeff and I opted to stick around and ride Tobias instead. Here is much of the trail:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWqr4OAitG0


Jeff rolling out at the middle road crossing.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/01.jpg


Creek crossing #2

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/02.jpg


Sketchy tree that we'll probably be dealing with on the ground next season

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/03.jpg


We closed the loop with a couple mile pedal across Sugarloaf road and then climbing up Tobias Meadow Rd 24S24. Not a bad climb at all, and very worth it!

Cool view on the climb up:

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/04.jpg


There is one section of trail lower down, maybe 1/4 mile, that still needs work. Plus some finish work in places. But I'd say this trail is open for business.

Orogenesis runs right past Frog Meadow on Rancheria Road at the upper end of the trail. It will add a bit of vert and distance, but I think adding Upper Tobias to Orogenesis is worthwhile especially for southbound riders since it's both an easy and scenic climb back up to Rancheria Rd. If people aren't into it, they can easily skip it.

Jeff had to take off but I wasn't done riding as I wanted to see what shape Pup Meadow trail was in. It got nuked in the 2021 Windy fire but it was still fully rideable a year ago when I was here. I figured there could be a bunch of deadfall already. It is a key connector for Orogenesis so we need to make sure it is passable.


Last year, the first part of the trail was hard to follow, but not overgrown. This year it has seen a bit of traffic so it is easier to follow, but getting overgrown in spots. At least this stuff will be easy to hit with a hedge trimmer!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/05.jpg


Parts of it are still clear and riding great

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/06.jpg


Most of it is like this with a bunch of branches and debris on the trail (a lot more than shown here, actually).

This is the only downed tree and would have been easy to cut out if I'd had my hand saw with me. Party foul.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/07.jpg


A bit of cool rock further out.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/08.jpg


I stuck my head down the Pup Meadow extension trail but it was in much rougher shape with downed trees, and overgrown. It has an easy fire road bypass though. I opted to check out that road instead, which was in great shape and pretty nice (unburned).

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/09.jpg


The main forest road below that has been widened for post-fire logging and was choked with silt.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/10.jpg


My reason for going this way was to check out another road that climbs back up to the start of Pup Meadow in case Pup gets too covered in deadfall. It was a bust with huge ruts, downed trees and heavy brush. After a quarter mile it all but disappeared.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/11.jpg


If needed, we can use Sugarloaf road as an alternate. It's a paved, but single lane road and very scenic.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/12.jpg


To get back to camp I hopped on FR 24S53 which is the road that crosses Upper Tobias mid-way. Then I climbed the upper part of the trail. Definitely did some hike a bike on the steeper parts but the rest was rideable.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/13.jpg

Bonus TR - still had a bit of time left in the day to do something else nearby. I had never been, so I opted to take a hike up to Baker Pt which has a defunct fire lookout.


The final approach was cool. And with the lookout in sight it seemed like it should be a quick hike. Wrong.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/14.JPG


Nice view to the north. The rock formation upper left is called the Needles. It used to have a fire lookout as well, but the volunteer manning it accidentally set it on fire a decade ago

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/15.jpg


The first part of trail kinda sucked with white thorn growing over the trail and big rocks to navigate around. Past that, it got nice. If you can see what might look like foot prints on the trail in the photo, those are bear tracks.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/16.jpg


The lookout. The door to both buildings was open. Lower one was kinda gross. Lookout was not so bad.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/17.jpg


The shitter has a nice view though

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/18.jpg


Looking south over the Kern River, Lake Isabella just visible in the distance. The hike was only 2mi roundtrip but packs a punch since it traverses way around on the north side of the peak before climbing up to the lookout. Made it back to the truck just at sunset. Perfect.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...upBaker/19.jpg

After the Baker Point hike I pointed the truck north and headed towards Camp Nelson. I had thoroughly scouted the trails in the area back in June, but I had one big item to check off today. Crawford Road 21S94 climbs all the way from Camp Nelson up to Windy Gap, where the Summit Trail crosses the road. It would make a good alternate route until all the deadfall gets cleared off Camp Nelson and Summit Trails. I had driven part of this road before, but there are some threatening signs where it crosses into the Tule River Indian Reservation and I had turned around. Since then I've confirmed that the road is open to the public through the Reservation, just be respectful. Stay on the road, no camping, no fires, etc.


Just before the Reservation, the road goes through a nice Sequoia grove.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/01.jpg


The road is pretty nicely graded. Windy Gap is out of sight on the right

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/02.jpg


The Windy fire burned over the ridgelines above and down the slope a bit but much of the road went through unburned forest. This is what a lot of the roads were like before the fire.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/03.jpg


Didn't see a single person on Crawford Rd. After riding over Windy Gap and back to Hwy M-90 I checked out a few forest roads off the highway for camping spots, and then did another side trip up to the Sequioa Crest community high above Camp Nelson. Orogenesis climbs up to Sequoia Crest after passing through Camp Nelson and then drops down to Wishon Campground. From there it heads north toward Mountain Home State Forest on the Doyle Trail.

The pic below is from Sequoia Crest looking over to Mountain Home. Moses Mountain and Dennison Ridge are on the left, with Mountain Home being the forested area just south of those peaks. Orogenesis heads up the valley bottom below on the Doyle Trail and then turns west, climbing up to Mtn Home. The 2020 SQF Complex fire burned all the way up the valley but looks like they did a good job of stopping it at the top.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/04.jpg


Quick stop to check out the Alder Creek Grove in Sequoia Crest, another area saved from the SQF fire.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/05.jpg


My plan for the afternoon was to re-scout the Doyle Trail. I wasn't sure how much of it burned, and it doesn't see a lot of use or maintenance. It's an important connector for Orogenesis.

When I got to Camp Wishon however I found temps were in the mid 90's and I was engulfed in a cloud of gnats immediately after getting out of the truck. Settled for a swim in the S Fork Tule River, and then moved on. I'll come back when temps are cooler.


I figured I had enough time to get up to Mtn Home and get in a quick ride. I did, but I'd need lights. Fortunately I did get to see conditions on the drive up the hill. The forest up top is mostly unburned. The forest on the lower slopes burned, much of it nuked.


Some of what used to be singletrack got bladed into dirt roads or doubletrack. I descended part way down this road but the singletrack I planned to take was gone, covered in deadfall and debris.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/06.jpg


Some singletrack remains. A bunch of logging was done, so there are now much "better" views. Sequoia Crest, where I'd been earlier, is in the distant ridge-top strip of forest on the right.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/07.jpg


I pushed up the singletrack towards the remaining forest

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/08.jpg


Another trail turned into road. Hopefully they will let these narrow back to singletrack.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/09.jpg


I got back onto real trail and connected to the inner loop. The big trees are still there. Some deadfall, but mostly the trails were their usual dusty selves.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/10.jpg


Ride thru tree. It was well past dark at this point and I didn't have any options that were short mileage so I just headed back to the truck.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...MtnHome/11.jpg


Here is what things looked like a week before the fire. https://www.tetongravity.com/forums/...to-Shaver-Lake

I planned to try and scout the lower trails at Mtn Home the following day and hopefully connect south to a mining road that climbs back up to the state forest. This entire area was likely in the burn zone, and parts of this were already in sub-par shape before the fire. So I wasn't sure how far I'd get.



Right from the campground I got onto a couple trails that started out ok but got progressively more covered in deadfall and debris the higher I climbed. I finally got to the upper dirt road/former trail I'd ridden the night before, and that took me over to the northern loop. That loop has seen traffic because there is a pack station that uses it to head up into the Golden Trout Wilderness.

The start of this northern loop trail is a bit "horsey" at the moment.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/01.jpg


It burned, alright

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/02.jpg


Pretty sad to see the forest like this. It was so lush before the fire.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/03.jpg


Got into a section that didn't burn so bad. Once the grade lessened the trail was still pretty nice

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/04.jpg

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/05.jpg


This log had inches thick bark on it last time I was here. The fire burned through a solid bit of wood too

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/06.jpg


I did a short side mission up to the Wilderness boundary, half mile north of the loop.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/08.jpg


Ditched the bike and hiked a bit further up into the Sequoia grove. This trail goes all the way north into Sequoia National Park.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/07.jpg


Back on the loop I headed south. The South Fork Tule River runs through this canyon with some really nice looking pools. Had to hike down to check a few out.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/09.jpg


And do a bit of fishing

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/11.jpg


Back on trail. There was some deadfall but it wasn't terrible.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/10.jpg


The trail has decent flow. And at the same time it's rocky and raw enough to you on your toes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzVgUA7f_3s


I crossed the road and picked up another trail that passes through the lower campground before contouring down the canyon. This one was even more technical.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hy0CLs3AHC4


Just after exiting I came across a CalFire / CDC prisoner crew of about 50 out doing some trailwork. They were about to head up another trail I planned to ride later. Thanks for the work guys!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/12.jpg


I headed a bit further down the road and picked up another trail that heads south towards Camp Wishon and the mining road. This trail drops down and crosses the river (not shown) and continues south to the National Forest boundary. It looked like the crew had just worked on this entire section.

I cross from State forest to National Forest at 2:11. Can you spot the difference in trail? Forgot to note it in the video - from 2:23 on is a different trail, the one the trail crew went up when I saw them. They had already finished this trail and one more by the time I caught up to them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYBYA9V7Rr4


About 100 feet after crossing the forest boundary, the trail looked like this:

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/13.jpg


I ditched the bike and hiked south. It was really overgrown in places but generally passable....for awhile

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/14.jpg


After crossing Silver Creek however, the deadfall got much worse. I crawled over multiple bunches of trees before I decided to turn around at this one. Good news is the tread is generally still there. But it will need lots of work to re-open. At least there is road access not far away.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/15.jpg


On the way back I stopped at this hole right below the trail for a swim

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/16.jpg


Then I headed back to where the work crew had gone. They had already finished two sections of trail by the time I caught up to them. Not sure what condition the trail was in before, but definitely looked good after they went through.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/17.jpg

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/18.jpg

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/19.jpg


Rather than try to pass them and get in the way I dropped back down the upper section (the video above from 2:23 on) and climbed back up the dirt road to camp. There is a third section which they were starting to work on that I'd tried to ride the night before, and found it completely gone. Hopefully they will get that one re-opened as this whole climb is what we want to use for Orogenesis.

We'll have to get the gnarly section between Mtn Home and Doyle Trail cleaned up though (section I turned around on earlier). There is a mile or so between where I turned around and the mining road, and another 4 miles south on the Doyle Trail to Camp Wishon.

I had set a time limit on the ride as I needed to get a ways north during the afternoon and hoped to be able to drive through Sequoia NP during daylight.


Stopped briefly to take in some views on the drive down from Mtn Home. Currently we are stuck taking pavement for about 70 miles leaving Mtn Home State Forest due to Wilderness and National Park rules. Not only that but we have to drop all the way down to the Central valley and then climb out again later. This is one of the gaps we've identified on the route.

That is Moses Mountain in the photo below. Once the route gets enough traction we will eventually propose a new singletrack from Mtn Home to South Fork Road near Three Rivers that will run across these slopes. If we can get it approved, it will eliminate half of that pavement. #goals

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/20.jpg


Until then, or if it never happens, riders will take Yokohl Road north to Three Rivers. It might be blazing hot, but at least there's no traffic.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/21.jpg

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/22.jpg


I made it into the park before dark and got to visit a few groves on the way through.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/23.jpg

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/24.jpg


The view from Kings Canyon at sunset did not suck.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...omeSQNP/25.jpg

The reason for my haste through Sequoia - Kings Canyon was a permit to hike the Rae Lakes loop. TR here --> https://www.tetongravity.com/forums/...64#post7142464

Backpack trip was over. I slept in and caught up on admin a bit, and then it was back to the Orogenesis scouting.


I was camped on Sierra National Forest land just outside King's Canyon NP and north of Grant's Grove village. There's a large plateau up top, part inside the park and part on Sierra NF land. Some ridges drop down to the west into a valley, and to the north to the Kings River. On one of those ridges, Verplank Ridge, starts a trail of the same name that drops 4,000ft in 5 miles down to the Kings River. There are a few other trails lower down as well - Sampson Flat, Davis Flat, Mill Creek etc. All of them are in serious states of disrepair, if they exist at all.

My first target was Verplank trail. It is missing from many current maps and following at least one fire, the trail barely exists on the ground - if at all. It is still shown on some maps though including the current USFS motor vehicle use map, since it is a moto-legal singletrack. It is notorious among moto riders for stranding those who explore it overnight when the trail disappears and it is too steep to ride back out. Rescuing bikes have taken teams of riders multiple days. Typical example: https://www.advrider.com/f/threads/t...angle.1323744/

It is a perfect connection for Orogenesis on paper although the steep grade may make it unsuitable. But that's why we scout these things.

Step 1 is to see if the trail even exists anymore. Last time I was here the area was still under a closure order for danger tree removal. At the river, Verplank intersects the Mill Flat trail which connects back to Mill Flat Campground. I hiked a bit of that trail and it does somewhat exist (the trail bench is there) but it soon became engulfed in poison oak and had no sign of use and no actual trail tread. I've looked for the other trails in the area at top and bottom and they have all similarly faded away.


Chicago stump is a cool spot, so I made a short side trip to check it out again.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/03.jpg


Cut down in 1893, it was the largest tree known to have been felled at the time. It was shipped in pieces to Chicago for the World's Fair where it was reassembled to prove that such large trees actually exist.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/01.jpg


But the people there thought it was a hoax. If only they had the internet like we do now, right? Right?

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/02.jpg


Riding on - there is a loop road that head's out to Verplank Ridge. The first part was pretty nice and had some great views.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/04.jpg


Found the turnoff for the trail. The spur road was narrow and rustic, but fully passable.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/05.jpg


End of the road

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/06.jpg


Things looked promising for a minute but I'm guessing the path was created by people like me stopping in to see what's up. Dead ends always see twice the traffic vs thru trails.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/07.jpg


Not far around the corner the deadfall began and the brush closed in. No hint of trail tread at all. I walked a bit further and it just got worse. That was all I needed to see.

Accounts from moto riders said it had been passable to maybe 3/4 mile down. But those accounts are over 10 years old. We'll put it on the long-term interest list but it isn't a priority since there is FR 12S01 that drops all the way down to the river as well.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/08.jpg


Back on the road I finished the loop.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/09.jpg


The second half was mostly pretty nice, but had a few super steep sections. I think we'd use the first half of the loop if it were needed.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/10.jpg


I headed back into the park

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/11.jpg


I wanted to scout some roads east of Grant's Grove. Similar to Verplank, a lot of the Sierra NF land behind Grant's Grove had been under closure order previously. I wanted to ride out all the way to Lookout Peak.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/12.jpg


There is a short, steep hike from the road's end up to the peak. Some pretty big deadfall and resulting social bypasses made it kind of hard to follow. It was a scramble at the end.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/13.jpg


But the views into King's Canyon were worth it.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/14.jpg


The Happy Fire had just started recently from lightning and was smoldering away happily

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/15.jpg


Got back down to the bike and headed out as I didn't want a long ride in the dark. Cool area though. There are some OHV trails, some dispersed camping options and a couple campgrounds in the area.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/16.jpg


Another awesome sunset from the highway

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Lookout/17.jpg


So the scouting for Verplank was a bust, but it's another good data point. If we want to use that trail, it's going to be a major project. Unfortunately there is difficult access at both top and bottom.

Another data point was that Mill Flat Creek road from this same area down to Sequoia Lake is closed due to washouts. That is the only other suitable route from Grant's Grove down to lower elevations. There had been some talk of bringing Orogenesis up to this area since there is a store and restaurant at Grant's Grove. But it's also a bit out of the way. And with no open routes back down, it's not something we can currently use regardless.

My campsite near Grant's Grove - nice shade, picnic table, pretty nice.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/01.jpg


The mission for today was to scout more of the forest roads east of Grant's Grove and north of Hume Lake. The first one which would make a logical route was pretty nice

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/02.jpg


There was a nice view over Hume Lake

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/03.jpg


Riding along I got to this spot where it became too steep and rocky for comfort on the moto (gnarly spot is out of sight and around the corner).

I won't ride down anything unless I know I can get out, and this section was be too gnarly for me to climb back up. I hiked down a couple turns to where it mellowed out.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/04.jpg


Headed back to the highway and stopped in at the General Grant Grove. Love these trees!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/05.jpg


The place was busy as always

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/06.jpg


Chunky

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/07.jpg


Next I headed south and started on the same loop from the other end. It started off as single lane pavement. There is a surprising amount of this type of road throughout our National Forests.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/08.jpg


I peeled off onto a smaller road and followed it to where I had turned around before.

This route is a decent connection for bikes. The steep section I'd encountered is just a few mins of hikeabike going uphill and would be rideable downhill on a MTB. There really aren't any other logical ways to connect where we need to go in this area if we decide to come up this way. My preference is to stay out of the park entirely. If people need to resupply, they can climb 5 miles up the highway. Doing so as an out and back is still a shorter distance than climbing all the way up here on dirt and and taking this loop.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/09.jpg


I checked out a few other forest roads and then headed back to camp. From there I headed down the hill and south to Eshom OHV area as there were a few things down there I wanted to check out.

That's Redwood Mountain up inside the park.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/10.jpg


There are a few options to get through Eshom. Most of the roads are narrow and quiet.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/11.jpg


I wanted to check out the road to Cherry Flat, which heads southeast about 5 miles from the OHV staging area. It drops down to a spot about 700ft above the North Fork Kaweah River.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/12.jpg


Drove out part way and unloaded the MTB. The road was getting rough and the bike would be faster. In retrospect should have rode the moto, but I expected some downed trees. There weren't any.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/13.jpg


The road was nice and primitive all the way down where there was eventually a turnaround.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/14.jpg


Wouldn't you know, there was a footpath heading downhill towards the river.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/15.jpg


Not many signs of (human) use, and the trail was pretty overgrown. But it's good to know it's there. Inside the park on the other side of the river is an old road alignment that runs all the way along the river to North Fork Drive, which connects to Three Rivers. Upgrading this connection for bike use would be our dream scenario as it would avoid about 35 miles of paved road riding. Unfortunately the Sequoia-Kings Canyon Wilderness boundary was drawn right down to the river which puts that old road alignment within Wilderness and a pipe dream for bikes. I did however see some satellite imagery recently that suggested this road bed had been bladed back into road, likely for fire access. So you never know....

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-Cherry/16.jpg

Planned to spend another day in the Eshom area mostly south of Hwy 180 and west of the park. There are a bunch of OHV roads some of which I scouted previously and others I wanted to scout for the first time.


Started from the Eshom OHV staging area again and headed north. The first forest road was pretty nice.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/01.jpg


Until I got here. Did not want to take the moto through cow shit infested mud. I hiked around and there were more mud holes like this within a couple hundred feet. Given this is late Sept with no rain in months these are likely a permanent problem. No thanks.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/02.jpg


I continued north toward Eshom campground and spotted singletrack off the roadside.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/03.jpg


It was pretty nice and connected to a trail that runs between the Hartland Christian camp and Eshom CG. Looks like it was used to access a prescribed burn. This one was not on my maps

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/04.jpg


I checked out some other roads and then headed north on the route towards Hwy 180. This connection was longer than I remembered.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/05.jpg


Decided to ride past Sequoia Lake and Delilah lookout. Found this sign on the north side of Hwy 180.

Setting your google maps app to "avoid tolls" forces it to route you off the highway onto OHV roads to avoid the Park entrance booths. This doesn't end well for those not driving high clearance vehicles. I've encountered passenger cars on these roads a few times whose drivers were wondering how they'd ended up there. Nice of the land managers to put up signs now.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/06.jpg


It didn't matter for me as I would be turning left off this road to head west. My road will climb up to a ridgeline that has great views on both sides.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/07.jpg


Looking south

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/08.jpg


And west

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/09.jpg


Two roads pass Delilah lookout. I rode the lesser used one, a narrow doubletrack. Made it within 500ft of the end before encountering deadfall. I hiked down to where the two roads meet, and there was deadfall on the other one as well. And quite overgrown. I drove both in 2018 or 2019. I guess they are not being maintained anymore? Too bad, because you can drive a long ways out on the ridge and it is very cool. Further out on the ridge there is another disappearing trail that drops down to Camp 4 on the Kings River. Like the others I could find the upper end, but it soon disappeared into heavy brush.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/10.jpg


Riding back. I really like Delilah ridge.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/11.jpg


The view south towards Eshom and in the distance the west side of Kings Canyon NP. Smoke was from the Coffeepot Fire above Three Rivers.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/12.jpg

It was getting on in the day and I wanted to look at some singletrack in the area. I've ridden two of the trails before the fire, Dogwood and Itchum. But I've never ridden the trail between Hartland and Eshom campground. I had also found a connector down to this trail from the main forest road.


I parked near where I'd found the singletrack connector earlier and hit the trail toward Hartland.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/13.jpg


It started off pretty nice and hit a few cool granite areas above the stream

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/14.jpg


There was a nice steep granite roller off the end of this one, right next to a waterfall

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/15.jpg


Little plank bridge was a nice touch

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/16.jpg


There were a few trees down. This one was a beast.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/17.jpg


I hit the end of the trail and then turned around to ride it back. When I got to the granite area I heard some crashing in the bushes and then barking, and a group of three hunting dogs approached from across the creek. I don't think they knew what to do with me. They followed me up the trail for a little while, sniffing around everywhere. Hunting isn't allowed after dark in CA and I'm not a fan of poaching so I called the fish and game tip line since there surprisingly was cell reception. A game warden called me back the next morning and said some of the locals like to run their dogs just for training, even at night, and there is no problem with them doing that. Cool, good to know.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/18.jpg


I wasn't done riding, I climbed up the road a few miles so I could hit Dogwood and Itchum. Spotted this California mountain kingsnake on the road. It was less than a foot long, and not thrilled to see me. I made sure it got off the road.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/19.jpg


Along the way I checked out the opposite end of the road from that morning with the cow shit bogs. About 500ft down the road was completely washed out with a 10ft deep gully. It would be a perfect route to use for Orogenesis if it was in good shape, but too many issues.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...Delilah/20.jpg


Dogwood and Itchum both burned in one of the recent fires. They were really cool before the fire with loamy trail surface below big trees. Some of those trees survived but it's not the dark lush forest it was before, the trails are covered in silt and sand, and are kind of a mess. The Hartland Trail needs to be logged out but I think it is a better way to go. Hitting Dogwood and Itchum also takes us a few miles out of the way.

Sequoia Lake

This place just north of Hwy 180. It's mostly private land but there is a trail around the lake which I did not think was open to the public.

Someone suggested connecting to that trail and then taking another connector over to the forest road to the west. I couldn't find anything on satellite or any mapping software/layer that shows anything exists besides the lake loop. Time to go take a look.


I found the connector trail. And it looks like limited public access exists. Doesn't mention bikes, but suggests only the route to the observation point is allowed. I kept going.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...avisRd/01b.jpg


Trail started off nice

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/01.jpg


And then.... this was a tough one to get around.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/02.jpg


And the deadfall kept coming after that. The trail was pretty mellow though and would be ok on a bike if allowed. I got around a corner and heard voices up ahead, some sort of crew working. I ditched the bike out of sight and walked on. Workers were doing some fuel reduction cutting brush above the trail, which was now covered. Didn't try to get through but asked a few questions. The workers weren't employees and didn't know about bikes or whether connecting south would be cool. Guess we'll just have to call and ask. Maybe they'll let us trade some trail maintenance for letting some bikepackers ride through. It doesn't look like they maintain the access trail very often.



After that it was time to do some driving down 12S01. Not sure what this road is actually called, I've seen a few names like Mill Flat Rd, Davis Rd, Sampson Flat Rd and Crabtree Road. Regardless, it drops all the way down to the Kings River. This is currently what we'll have to use for the route.

That's Sampson Flat down in the middle.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/04.jpg


Part way down I stopped to check out a side road. This one climbs up to Delilah Ridge just north of the lookout. It had a bunch of downed trees at the top. At the bottom here the corridor was obvious but no sign of recent use. Just some old tire tracks in hardened dirt. It got overgrown pretty quickly.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/05.jpg


Looking across from the switchbacks you can just barely make out a road or trail climbing right to left to a saddle on the left side of the pic. That should be the Davis Flat trail which connects to Verplank Trail on some maps. I couldn't find where it connects to the road though.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/06.jpg


Part of the switchbacks. They are pretty long ones, but that makes the grade of the road fairly mellow.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/07.jpg


Looks smooth here but the road was in a lot worse shape than the other times I've driven it. Having a moto on a hitch carrier definitely didn't help. I had to go slow and careful to avoid dragging the carrier across some of the ruts and grade dips.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/08.jpg


Maps show another old road dropping down this ridgeline. But again I couldn't see anything. It's really steep.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/09.jpg


The terrain gets much steeper towards the bottom of the canyon.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/10.jpg


And there is water. I'd definitely wait to filter from the Kings River if needing to fill up though. Lots of cattle not far above this point.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/11.jpg


I got down to the river and parked. I wanted to take another look for the Camp 4 Trail that drops down from Delilah Ridge. I had looked for it once before at the river but I had a gps track this time. Standing there I thought I could see the profile of a trail from below. When I got up there - nothing. I walked some transects straight up and down the hill in a few different spots crossing where a series of switchbacks was shown. If it was there I would have crossed the trail a number of times. Nothing. We might just have to wait until the hill eventually burns and see what emerges. Otherwise, if we want a trail it might as well be new layout. That would probably be better since we could add some extra switchbacks to reduce the grades.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/12.jpg


Maybe higher up something would be visible, but I was already covered in burrs and running out of light. Something to explore on another day. I changed out of those clothes and went for a swim.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/13.jpg


Decided to head to the other side of the river to camp. But found the site I wanted already occupied. He agreed to move along though....

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...DavisRd/14.jpg


For now we'll need to use the road 12S01 as the route. It would be nice to have singletrack available to ride here instead. But from what I've read, and looking at elevation profiles, all the trails here would be too steep to climb. So riders might want to take the road anyways. The trails would make awesome descents, albeit with ridiculously long shuttles. The top of Verplank is too far out of the way for that trail to make sense. The Camp 4 trail would add Delilah Ridge which is really cool plus some singletrack without adding a bunch of extra miles. But the singletrack looks very steep averaging 750ft/mile of vert for 4.5 miles. And no sign of it on the ground. The other road off Delilah Ridge might be the most realistic alternative, but you are just trading one road for another with a lot of extra work to open it back up. That isn't worth it to me. Similar to other areas, I think we'll keep Verplank and Camp 4 on the long term project list and re-visit once the route is open and running.

Mid Sept now. Camp on the Kings River. Warm temps down there so I sat out pretty late and stared at stars. The hammock chair is awesome for that.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/01.jpg


First on my list was to check out the Bear Wallow Trail. I tried to hike up it a few years ago and lost it within the first 500ft, nothing but tall grass and weeds. But the Basin Fire burned this area back in May, so I wanted to see if anything emerged from the ashes.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/02.jpg


It looked promising at the bottom but there were a number of different paths going different directions.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/03.jpg


It wasn't until I got up a bit higher and saw the switchbacks that I knew there was really a trail there

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/04.jpg


I kept hiking higher to see what I could see

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/05.jpg


Nice views back down to the river

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/06.jpg


I passed one section where the trail dropped down rather than staying high as shown on the USFS map. Couldn't see any trace higher up. But it joined back up after a steep climb and kept chugging towards another saddle.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/07.jpg


It started to get pretty narrow

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/08.jpg


This was becoming pretty typical, about 8" of bench. I could see it contouring way up along the slope and out of sight. I hadn't expected the trail to exist let alone get this far up so I hadn't come prepared and was out of water. I had made it 2 miles and about 1200ft up, or about half way to the ridge top. Time to turn around.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/09.jpg


Looks cool from up above!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/10.jpg


Hopefully I can make it back again soon when temps are cooler. But I was stoked to have found some usable trail. No telling what it might look like higher up. I think the fire did go all the way to the ridge top though.

Back at camp I went for a swim. The water was really nice! Then I packed up and started up the Blackrock Road

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/11.jpg


Bailey Bridge

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/12.jpg


Now with a route marker. This is a mandatory crossing for the route. There is no other way to get from north to south unless we go west of Pine Flat Reservoir, which would require dozens of pavement miles.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/13.jpg


Another bridge with some decorative coloring this time. Blackrock Road is pretty cool. It's paved much of the way, but narrow single lane road with steep cliffs above and below. And light traffic.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/14.jpg


Looking up the canyon. Blackrock Reservoir drains out here.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/15.jpg


Keep your eyes on the road

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/16.jpg


Bear Wallow Trail ends at the saddle in the middle of the pic below. There is a road that climbs up to this saddle from the reservoir. And another one that drops down to the saddle from behind the peak on the left. I tried to access the reservoir road on the drive up but it was infested with deadfall and overgrown (heard that before?) and not worth spending hours exploring since we would want to connect all the way to the top. I've driven down almost to the saddle before and planned to scout it again soon.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ckrock/17b.jpg


Looking for a campsite now, I kept driving. The road turns to dirt soon after passing the reservoir.

There are some cool views looking up towards Wishon Reservoir from this road. The canyon holds a lot of nice granite.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/18.jpg


Rancheria Creek Falls. I could hear the water from across the canyon.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ackrock/19.jpg


Found a decent campsite near the top of the switchbacks. I would finish the drive up to Wishon Res in the morning.

Just another day....

My campsite for the night. Just a pullout off the road, but had a decent view.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/01.jpg


Looking south back to the switchbacks I'd driven night before. Blackrock Reservoir is just out of sight around the corner

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/02.jpg


And a better view looking north towards Wishon Reservoir. If you look closely you can see the line of a road near the top on the left. That is Crabtree Road 11S01. It's a cool narrow road that has cliff edge exposure through the area in the pic, then turns north and heads up to Wishon Reservoir. If the route comes up this way rather than Bear Wallow Trail, this is the road I'd want to take. The Blackrock Rd I'd driven up is a pretty ho-hum wide dirt road.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/03.jpg


I found a spot to park and unloaded the moto. Token shot with Wishon Reservoir as a backdrop.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/04.jpg


I headed south to Rodgers Ridge. The road along this ridge eventually drops to the saddle where Bear Wallow Trail begins.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/05.jpg


View looking south over Kings Canyon

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/06.jpg


The road heads west as primitive doubletrack for a ways before dropping down a series of switchbacks. I was able to drive part way down the switchbacks a few years ago before hitting deadfall.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/07.jpg


View looking west from the road. You can just barely see Blackrock Road down there. Bear Wallow runs along the ridge from the left. Can't see any hint of a trail from here

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/08.jpg


My ride came to a dead stop almost 2 miles from the saddle where Bear Wallow begins. I wasn't prepared to do a long hike in today, so I turned around here with plan to come back another day.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/09.jpg


Hmm... this tree wasn't here on the ride in. Fortunately the it had broken into pieces on the right side and I was able to pull a section off the road so I could get through.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/10.jpg


I headed back to the reservoir and then west towards Dinkey Creek resort, following a series of forest roads on the south and then north side of the main McKinley Grove road.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/11.jpg


Lots of logging going on all across the Sierra Nat'l Forest

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/12.jpg


I had scouted some of these before but it was good to confirm which ones are still good for the route and which ones are not so good. Things can change over time. A lot of the roads used for logging are now a loose, silty mess.


Headed back towards the reservoir. Of interest, there is a singletrack shown on maps called Cliff Camp Trail that starts just south of the reservoir and travels 3.5 miles south towards Rodgers Ridge across the terrain pictured below. I have only been able to find the start and end of it. It soon disappears. Another trail that looks like it would be worth resurrecting!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...sShaver/13.jpg

In the afternoon I headed a bit west towards Shaver Lake. There are a three trail segments someone recommended that I had not been aware of and are not on any maps. They were billed as rad granite segments. They look good on maps as connectors.


Found the first one.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/01.jpg


I rode up a short forest road spur to get to it. I had been seeing RV trailers parked all over the place, all of them unattended and was wondering what was up. I found out a couple days later hunting season was about to start and these were all hunters trailers staking out their spots.

The ratio of unattended trailers to deer I had spotted was about 100:1 so far. Good luck, guys!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/02.jpg


The trail continues. I cut out one small tree here.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/03.jpg


Then, they multiplied. Being a good citizen I cut these ones out too.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/04.jpg


Then it got much worse and I gave up. A hundred yards ahead the trail turned uphill to the right and any hint of trail disappeared.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/05.jpg


I followed the GPS line cross country until I got to this slab section. I was finally able to ride again.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/06.jpg


But be careful which way you go. Some lines end in a cliff. I tried to follow the GPS line but it didn't really mesh with the terrain. Looking at the obvious lines, this would be a great freeride trail but a shitty bikepacking trail regardless of which way you were riding.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/07.jpg


The bottom of the drainage. Need to cross the low spot to a campsite and then climb out back to the highway.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/08.jpg


I crossed the highway and checked out another segment of route on that side. It went in a couple hundred yards past another campsite with more unattended trailers. From there the road climbed steeply up a silt-infested slope.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/09.jpg


After 500ft or so, it levelled off and was really nice riding.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/10.jpg


Headed back to the truck and drove on. Caught a nice sunset from a highway viewpoint.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/11.jpg


I still had one more segment to check out. There was no hint of trail at all here. The trail looks like it would go to the right of the rock formation and then start dropping down.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/12.jpg


It seemed to cross left to right here and then cross back to the left out of sight below. It was almost rideable to here given the lack of brush.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/13.jpg


Looking back up. This part was pretty steep. I couldn't find a logical place to drop off this rock area. Below this was thick forest and again, no hint of a trail anywhere. There was almost 1/4 mile of forest down to the nearest road.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erSlabs/14.jpg



I'm a bit puzzled as to why either of these sections were recommended for Orogenesis. There is no trail for the most part. They are super steep. They might be fun for freeriding on an unloaded bike if there was a trail - but there isn't . Even if there was a trail, most bikepackers would not be able to ride down this stuff on a loaded bike.

Thanks for keeping this TR going! I really do need to spend more time in southern CA.

For sure! Even though a lot of it looks like shit because I'm exploring for a very specific route, there is a ton of fun trail to ride down here and on the west side Sierra.

Another day.... still mid Sept, near Shaver Lake.


Despite spending quite a bit of time in the area I had never checked out the Bald Mtn OHV trails. Along the with shortcuts I'd explored the previous day, the current Orogenesis route uses another shortcut that drops down from Bald Mtn trails to another granite section that is part of the Tour de Granite ride. This shortcut was described as "used to be there, might take a bit of work to make it rideable again." The plan was to check this out as a way to get to Bald Mtn, plus a couple other spots.


And this is what it looked like. No hint of trail at all. But definitely some cool granite. Like the two other spots, it would make for a great freeride trail if a trail actually existed. It was steeeep to get up here.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/01.jpg


On the climb up I was thinking that a better spot for a trail would be down in this valley between the ridge and Bald Mtn. A local I talked to later mentioned this specifically when I asked about any connection here.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/02.jpg


It's a tough life trying to grow out of solid granite.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/03.JPG


This is the rest of the shortcut route. Terrain gets a lot more suitable for a trail. But there was one more steep hike a bike section to get to the top which you can see on the right.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/04.jpg


The view from Bald mtn looking over Shaver Lake

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/05.jpg


The Bald Mtn lookout tower is up there in the distance on the left. Still a ways to go

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/06.jpg


Looking north towards Huntington Lake and the Kaiser Wilderness

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/07.jpg


Bald Mtn lookout tower. It was rebuilt by a local 4x4 club at some point so it's now more of a view tower.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/08.jpg


The trail up to the tower alternated between sandy/DG jeep trail and granite slab. It got steep in places but was mostly rideable. There were often multiple jeep lines which means even more MTB lines. I dropped off the summit and headed east on some other trails. These were steeper with more rocky and ledgy terrain. It was all rideable downhill, but would have a decent amount of hike a bike heading uphill.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/09.jpg


After exiting the Bald mtn system I climbed up the road a couple miles to take another look at the Dinkey Creek Trail. Dinkey is shown on most maps but a lot of it no longer exists on the ground. This upper part north of the Dinkey Creek campground is on all the maps. It goes up to some pools in Dinkey Creek. Access from the north is via an old mining road. I tried to access it a few years ago and dropped down a half mile, but I wasn't prepared for a long hike that day and turned around. This time, with bike, I would either ride through to the campground or have to do some hiking back out.

This is the old mining road. It's pretty rough but mostly rideable downhill. It would be 100% hike a bike headed up.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/10.jpg


I hadn't gotten all the way down this road last time. At the bottom I found a fairly obvious trail complete with some flagging. It was a bit overgrown but not hard to pass through.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/11.jpg


Trail sign at the intersection with Dinkey Creek trail. Things were looking really promising. I ditched the bike and followed the Dinkey trail north to the pools. Definitely hiker only trail to the pools.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/12.jpg


Back at the bike, I headed downstream. The trail was impressively rideable with just a bunch of old trees down on the ground. Most, aside from the new ones, could be ridden over. There was a steep drop down at the end that had some very tight rock squeezes I had to lift the bike over. Otherwise, this is a fantastic trail if we can link it in. The mining road section and connector would need some work but there is good road access for that.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/13.jpg


The Dinkey Creek campground is my main hesitation in trying to use this. It is run by a concessionaire and they charge for day use access to the area. And they are quite militant about it. I don't think bikepackers would want to pay $10 just to ride through a campground. Not sure they are allowed to charge for people just passing through to access Nat'l forest trail without using any amenities. Will have to check with the Forest Service on that.

I climbed up this trail out of the campground picnic area rather than ride through the campground. Unfortunately it turned into a mess of deadfall about 2/3 of the way up. It does not link well to the rest of the route.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/14.jpg


I pedaled back up the road to the OHV trails to check out one more trail for the day. It was late afternoon by now and I hadn't brought lights, so I had a turnaround plan in case the trail was in poor shape.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/16.jpg


It turned out to be pretty awesome with some nice granite sections and steeps.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/17.jpg


Perfect view to enjoy golden hour

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/18.jpg


It was on the technical side with some really tough corners, and a few spots that were too gnarly to ride. But also some nice cruisy sections.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/20.jpg


Typical corner

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...inkeyCr/21.jpg


Made it to the bottom before sunset and had a short but cold pedal back to the truck. Lots of good stuff found today. And the not-so-good non-existent connector from this morning. Need to find a better way around there because Bald Mtn is really cool and worth using for the route.

Still mid Sept, still Shaver Lake.


Took care of some admin in the morning.

Mid afternoon I headed over to Ely Mtn to check out the trails there. I rode Cannonball and Thunderstruck. The trails on Ely Mtn were built by the Yosemite South Gate Trails Cooperative in partnership with Socal Edison, who owns the land.


This footage from Thunderstruck is from a later day when I rode with some locals, but way better since I knew the lines and had a rider to follow. Really fun trail

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VA4RNlvMDsw


And Cannonball, from this ride

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbwZ886Vtg4



Pics are all from this day.

Ebikes not welcome here. Too bad for them, as there is a road climb right from the bottom that would be perfect to run laps on. I'm sure people do it anyways.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/01.jpg


There is a pedal in at the top to each trail if you're shuttling. You'll enjoy some nice views of Balsam Forbay Reservoir and the Kaiser Wilderness in the distance

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/02.jpg


Heading to Cannonball there is a singletrack option near the top of the climb not shown on Trailforks, so of course I took it.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/04.jpg

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/05.jpg


It goes out to a nice lookout before re-joining the access road

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/06.jpg


Start of Cannonball. It's the more technical of the two main trails. Thunderstruck is more flowy with go-arounds for features.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...ElyMtn/07b.jpg


Cool section of trail

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/08.jpg


Made it back up for Thunderstruck around sunset

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/09.jpg


Nice rock roll to start

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/10.jpg


Make sure you have enough momentum for this one. It's a pretty vertical entrance

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/11.jpg


Nice sunset view from up here

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/12.jpg


Another optional roll

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...-ElyMtn/13.jpg


Both are really fun trails. I would have to come back to check out the third trail, Granite.

Still mid Sept, still near Shaver Lake


This was in the middle of a week-long cold front, and rain was in the forecast for today so I planned to do some driving rather than riding.

North of Huntington Lake is Kaiser Peak and the Kaiser Wilderness. There is a whole section of forest between this and the Ansel Adams Wilderness that is regular National Forest land. It is a pretty big area with a whole network of forest roads. I have not been able to explore it previously because the road in, Stump Springs Road, has been under fire closure or closure for danger tree removal every time I've visited. But the road was open on one end as of August.


Rain on the road driving up to Kaiser Pass

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/01.jpg


There are two main dirt roads that form a loop, 6S02 and 7S05. That is what I planned to drive, and see what I could see. I couldn't resist this doubletrack off 7S05 that would bypass some of the wider road.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/02.jpg


This deadfall wouldn't stop bikes but it stopped me in the truck.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/03.jpg


The sign was amusing. But also sad because you know it is there because this had become a big enough problem to get noticed.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/04.jpg


Continued on to 6S02. Mt Tom came into view

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/05.jpg


I decided to take a side trip up there to check out the fire lookout, and got hit by more rain on the climb up

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/06.jpg


It was a steep, narrow road. Was happy that I didn't run into anyone driving the opposite direction

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/07.jpg


There was a truck parked by the lookout tower which meant it was still open. I walked around a bit up top

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/08.jpg


The lookout volunteer called me up to check out the views. He was cleaning up as this was his last full day for the season. Said the other side of Stump Springs is closed due to large washouts on the road.

Looking south to Kaiser Peak

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/09.jpg


North to Ansel Adams wilderness and Yosemite

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/10.JPG


Looking down at granite domes in the distance

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/11.JPG


And north-west, the back side of Mammoth Mtn came into view when the clouds cleared a bit

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/12.jpg


I dropped back down and continued the tour. The road got more primitive for a while heading around the north side of Mt Tom

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/13.jpg


Really nice section to drive through. The roads were mostly in good shape. There were lots of hunters around and they seem to clear out the deadfall.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/14.jpg


As I continued around the road transitioned back to main road. It headed through a few areas that got nuked in the Creek fire. Other parts were untouched or just had the ground fuel burnt off.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/15.jpg


Rain started again on the drive out and got pretty heavy as I headed back to Shaver Lake. I wasn't able to find a few things I needed in town, so I dropped down to Fresno. Also on the menu - In n Out and cheaper gas and groceries. Rain was done by the time I got back up the hill, and warmer temps on the way in coming days.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...erMtTom/16.jpg


I was stoked to finally get to check out the area north of Kaiser. I don't think we would use it for Orogenesis because it goes pretty far out of the way and would bypass needed resupply options in Shaver Lake. But for a local bikepacking loop, it will be a great option once Stump Springs Road is open on both ends.

Still mid Sept, still in the Shaver Lake area


I wanted to head back to Rodgers Ridge and see if I could access the upper end of Bear Wallow trail on foot. Riding the moto in a few days before there was a downed tree about 2mi from the end of the road. This time I brought food, water, hand saw, and chainsaw so I could get down to the saddle and hopefully onto Bear Wallow.


Rode the moto in to the big downed tree on Rodgers Ridge and then started hiking

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/01.jpg


View from the top of the switchbacks. Bear Wallow should climb up the hill somewhere to the right of the saddle

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/02.jpg


One of the switchbacks. This one was still seeing traffic until not long in the past.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/03.jpg


Around the next corner was the first big patch of deadfall. There was no sign of any use beyond it. I started cutting branches and downed logs to make access easier.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/04.jpg


When I said no sign of any use, that wasn't completely accurate. And this wasn't the type of log I was cutting.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/05.jpg


I got down to the saddle near Wiesbrod Spring where Bear Wallow begins. The abandoned road that climbs up from Blackrock Reservoir ends here as well. A very large log had been intentionally placed across it at this junction, so it was obvious the Forest service wants it closed. Rodgers Ridge road just had normal deadfall for an unmaintained road.

There appeared to be a couple foot paths heading west from this junction. One would likely go down to the spring. The other should be Bear Wallow. Within a hundred feet though, it looked like this.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/06.jpg


No hint of a trail bed, no corridor in the brush or sign of cut logs. Nothing. I pushed on ahead through the brush trying to follow the line on the GPS but it got so thick it was almost impassable. These were large shrubs like cyanothus that grow tall and mesh together. I found a downed tree to walk along which provided a bit of a break and even there it was tough to push through. In an open patch 100ft ahead I found what could have been remnants of old trail tread, but it soon disappeared again. I couldn't see any thing that resembled trail up on the hill above and the brush appeared continuous all the way up the hill. Unfortunately it might take another fire to burn off this brush to see what's underneath. Either that, or just cut new trail through the growth. I had been hoping to explore a mile or two along the ridge top but given how tough progress was, I decided I could better spend the time elsewhere.


View down into Kings Canyon on the hike out.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/07.jpg


I rode the moto over towards Dinkey Creek to check out a few forest road connections. This missing bridge right by Dinkey is currently the route across the creek. We'll need to re-route to the bridge on McKinley Grove Rd just to the south.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/08.jpg


I was looking for forest roads that would connect around the slab shortcuts I had scouted earlier that had non-existent trail. Found a few good ones that connect pretty well.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/09.jpg


The current route uses this road. Lots of deadfall, but we could log it out and scrape in a line to have singletrack.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/10.jpg


Or use this other road that ends up at the same spot. Personally I'd go with option 2. We have enough work to do already.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/11.jpg


I checked out some connections on the west side of Dinkey Creek as well. I found this trail which connects well up to Bald Mtn, but it leads to a Forest Service work center. We'll have to find out if they are cool with bikes passing through.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...eDinkey/12.jpg


I think the next move with Bear Wallow is to do another hike in from the bottom once the weather cools down and see if we can make it up to the ridge top. It's going to be a major project to get this trail going again. Unfortunately this area does not have a lot of local riders.

Getting into late Sept. Still in Shaver Lake area.

I wanted to head back to Bald Mtn and see if there were any better ways to get through the area. The way I had dropped off the summit would require a lot of hike a bike going the other direction, but I'd seen some green rated trails that might bypass the steeper parts.


I headed in from where I had camped on the north side of Bald Mtn. This is pretty typical of the grade for much of the way in.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/01.jpg


There are a couple steep parts mixed in, and then as you get closer to the summit things get steep. But grippy.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/02.jpg


View from the lookout tower

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/03.jpg


Then I set off to look for green trails. This one was not bad. Grades were pretty decent but it was more sandy.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/04.jpg


Same trail, lower down

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/05.jpg


I checked out a couple trails that were labelled green on one end but got kinda gnarly. I then found them labelled blue or black at the other end. They would be ok by MTB, but each would have some hike a bike on the steeper parts depending on your direction of travel

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/06.jpg


Next I headed north and checked out some forest roads heading towards Huntington Lake. As with other areas some patches were nuked by the fire and some were burned lightly or unburned.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/07.jpg


I climbed up a bit towards Red Lake. The road to it is a popular OHV trail and the jeeps and SXS were out in force. Lots of hunters out. Being mid day a lot were already higher up towards the lake and I only encountered a few out of a group of 10 jeeps heading down before I turned off.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/08.jpg


I turned onto a spur road that heads up behind China Peak. I soon ran into a locked gate and set off on foot to see if I could find any sign of the Chinese Peak Trail. This is another singletrack I've been looking at on maps for years but never got around to checking out. It connects from China Peak over to Kaiser Pass Road near Weldon Camp and Badger Flat. It would make an excellent connector for Orogenesis and would also make a great loop above Huntington Lake. But I've never heard of anyone riding it, and it shows zero activity on heat maps. I didn't know what to expect.

I poked around and didn't see any obvious tread, but then I spotted a small cairn. Looking both directions I saw another cairn each way. Then I could make out a vague path between them. I walked about 1/4 mile along the trail before deciding this was worth coming back for with the MTB.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/09.jpg


I headed back down the mountain and checked out a few more forest roads. You can't get all the way to Huntington on them, but you can get pretty close. And even closer if the ski area will allow you to ride their access roads.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/10.jpg


I made it back to the truck with an hour of sunlight left so I decided to head back to Ely Mountain and do a lap before dark. I was prepared to climb back up with lights but met a few locals who offered me a ride back up. One of them, Kevin, seemed to remember meeting me on a scouting trip 6 years ago. He recalled me hobbling around with a knee injury (I had ACL surgery 2018) and looking at crossing a fairly deep creek in my old tacoma. Small world.

Had a great run on Thunderstruck. It's the go pro vid from post #69

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...tington/11.jpg


Fun day out exploring again. I think the current Orogenesis route through the Bald Mtn OHV trails is as good as we are going to get. It has some hike a bike but mostly on solid granite. It is possible to bypass some of it, but it adds distance and puts the summit lookout further off route.

Late Sept, still Shaver Lake area

After finding the remnants of Chinese Peak trail the day before, I headed back with the bike. While it would be possible to loop it from Huntington Lake I opted to self shuttle up to give myself more time. Because you never know....


If I made it through the trail I would cross Kaiser Pass Rd and climb up to Potter Pass. The descent back to Huntington is really fun. There is a possible bailout down Big Creek not shown on the paper map, which would be about half way across

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/01.jpg


LFG. I shuttled about half way up the dirt road climb to an OHV staging area for Red Lake.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/02.jpg


Pedaled up and picked up the trail. First of many cairns to come

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/03.jpg


Spotted tire tracks, this was a good sign!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/04.jpg


I followed them down to this point, a quarter mile later. This was the last I'd spot any sign of traffic.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/05.jpg


Finding a piece of wing was not so promising. I walked a circle 50-100m around this wing but didn't see anything else.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/06.jpg


Started seeing a lot more downed trees. This one was huge. It was getting harder to pick up the trail again on the other side. Very vague, where you could see anything at all. I spent a lot of time walking forward and back to sniff out the next section of trail.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/07.jpg


Nice rocky section that was partially rideable

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/08.jpg


Aside from cairns there were occasional blazes and ribbons as well - green, red and white/blue. I added some orange ribbon on a few sections I'd had trouble at.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/09.jpg


The trail goes through a small rocky valley here. It got pretty hard to follow for a while. No visible tread at all, and lots of deadfall. Finally, made it through.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/10.jpg


Thankfully scooters aren't allowed! Part of the trail near the end is old road bed. It leads to an old cabin called Weldon's Camp.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/11.jpg


I had forgotten that there is a singletrack parallel to the road from Weldon's to Kaiser Pass Road. It's pretty trashed from horse traffic but mostly heads downhill after a short climb.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/12.jpg


The Rancheria Creek crossing. Just an easy climb up to the road from here

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/13.jpg


Onwards to Potter Pass. It was looking like I'd have enough time to finish the ride and get in a swim before dark.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/14.jpg


The trail tops out at Potter Pass which is as far as bikes can go. Fortunately there is a fun trail that drops all the way to Huntington Lake.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/15.jpg


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsqscPCeQKE


Temps were nice and warm again so it was nice to sit out under a full moon.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...kPotter/16.jpg


For as poor shape as Chinese Peak Trail was in, at least it exists and was HAB-passable. There are probably 150 downed trees and tread is so far gone on over half the trail you can't see any hint of it. I hope we can get this trail resurrected at some point. It ties in well enough with Orogenesis that we could use it. And you could loop it from Huntington with Potter Pass trails for a killer ride.

Late Sept - still near Shaver Lake


I had ridden two trails on Ely Mountain but there is a third one called Granite that I wanted to check out.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqnZBwt9WjU


Nice view over Shaver Lake

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/01.jpg


Lots of steep slabs, though the trail is a bit lacking in anything difficult until you get to the singletrack at the end. The hardest part was figuring out where it goes...it seemed like there were a lot of extra cairns that didn't make sense. Not a big deal once you've ridden it once or twice, but it was annoying for a first lap.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/02.jpg


I came across the local SAR team partway down, doing some training. I think they were a bit surprised to have a biker drop down on them from above. Despite the hard to follow cairns I was not in need of their services however.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/03.JPG


After the ride I hopped on the moto to check out a few nearby roads.

This is why you scout and re-scout. Dawn Road was a cool forest road before the fire, that we were using for Orogenesis. It's a great connector and I've driven my truck on it a couple times. Time to find a re-route.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/04.jpg


This is another road that connects to Dawn Rd. It was previously abandoned and going back to singletrack, but was re-graded for logging post-fire.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/05.jpg


I pedaled down it about 3 miles where it connects to Dawn Road. This intersection is half a mile down from the gully pictured above. What I saw there was not good:

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/06.jpg


More washouts as far as the eye can see.

Dawn Road continues as a shelf road for about 4 miles. It looks like every spot where the road crosses a gully is washed out. At the far end, Dawn connects to the Old Railway Grade Rd which is a similar shelf road running for many miles above the San Joaquin River valley. That road is under Forest Service closure order so it is likely in similar or worse condition as Dawn Road. It will probably take the Forest Service a long time to repair them.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/07.jpg


I did find an alternate route along a powerline corridor that will work.

If we use the Thunderstruck Trail for Orogenesis, this alternate will come out right where Thunderstruck meets Huntington Lake Road, which is perfect. From there riders can take the alternate all the way down to Shaver Lake for resupply. The main Orogenesis route will have to follow Huntington Lake Road north for a couple miles and then drop down the paved Powerhouse Road to the river. There were construction crews working on Old Railroad west of Huntington Lake Road but I'm not sure how far they have gotten. And they have a long ways to go.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/08.jpg


After the road scouting it was time to re-locate towards Bass Lake.


Looking across the San Joaquin River Valley. You can see the trail of the same name on the far side of the valley, lower down. This trail is eventually supposed to connect all the way from Hwy 99 near Fresno to Mammoth Lakes.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/09.jpg


Crossing the river

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/10.jpg


I found this spot randomly a few years ago. The geographic center of California.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/11.jpg

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/12.jpg


Nice sunset! No one around, it was super quiet.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...teRoads/13.jpg


I have spent a lot of time this year scouting new stuff and re-scouting old. The washouts on Dawn Road show how important it is to do this, especially in burned areas. There are a lot more of those to scout following the current fire season.

Late September, now in Bass Lake area


The 2020 Creek Fire also raged across the Bass Lake area. I wanted to check out as much of the route there as possible.


First stop was to see if any work has been done on the French Trail, aka San Joaquin River Trail. In this area it roughly follows the Minarets Road before dropping down to Mammoth Pool reservoir.

New carsonite posts were put up after the fire, all of which point towards trail that is completely non-existent. I got excited driving past one crossing at night and seeing trail tread heading away from the road on both sides. Turned out it was just a cow path. No work has been done at all.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/01.jpg


Looking out toward some of the granite domes I'd seen from Mt Tom

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/02.jpg


My next stop was to do a quick MTB ride on FR 8009. When I scouted this one a few years back it had a ton of deadfall and a couple landslides. 8009 cuts off some pavement riding and would be a nicer, more primitive road than FR 7S07 provided it's in passable condition.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/03.jpg


The good news is it was very passable. The big trees down before had burned away and it looked like a rancher ran his cattle down the road and cut out new deadfall to ATV width.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/04.jpg


Down near the bottom I stopped in at the Jesse Ross cabin, built in the 1860s. Glad I did as there was a Forest Service crew repairing a fence there. Talked to them for a few mins, they are a fire crew that helps out with recreation projects like this fence at times. Said they had started working on rehabbing the French Trail the season before the Creek Fire but all their work was destroyed. He said they'll get back to it as time allows.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/05.jpg


Third project for the day was to unload the moto and ride as much of the route as possible to see how things looked. Lower down the forest got torched. But after a couple years of widespread closures, the roads were mostly open again.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/06.jpg


Orogenesis turns off the main forest road 7S07 and follows a smaller road north. I really like this smaller road as it passes through a couple narrow passages that were excavated out to make the road. It's also narrow and sees minimal use due to a large washout mid-way. There is a bypass around the washout that only hikers and two-wheeled vehicles can use.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/07.jpg


I headed over towards the top of Blind Squirrel Trail which runs down a massive granite playground.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/08.jpg


And then dropped down Road 8029, another road I really liked. It was narrow, winding road that ran through dense forest with lush vegetation. Part of it burned, and it was definitely not as lush as before with much of the vegetation burned off, but hopefully it will come back.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/09.jpg


While it's not quite the same post-fire, it is still a cool route. We have Orogenesis set up so that riders can descend Blind Squirrel whether riding Orogenesis north or south. If heading south, you'll climb up this road, descend BS and connect back to the route on Browns Creek Rd.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/10.jpg


Next I headed up to Shuteye Pass trail, which is an option for Orogenesis. It climbs 2000ft up from Minarets Road to Shuteye Pass and then drops 500ft down on this side of the mountains. So it would be a pretty direct way of crossing over.

I had never gotten around to scouting it because it doesn't tie in to the route very well. It requires over 10 miles of pavement riding whether you hit it from the south or the north.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/11.jpg


I had no trouble finding the trail but it was steep and rocky. Too steep and rocky to be suitable for bikes IMO. Nevermind loaded bikepacking rigs.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/12.jpg


It would be all hike a bike uphill and plenty of HAB downhill. Not worth riding 10+ miles of pavement for this.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/13.jpg


At the pass I spotted a few cairns that may have marked a trail heading down the other side, but I could not spot any hint of tread. It is a steep and rocky slope heading down to Minarets Road. I checked out the bottom a couple years ago. The forest down there got nuked. As with French Trail there was a shiny new carsonite post pointing to a spot where no trail existed. Even if there were a trail I think it would be too steep for bikepacking. I think we can finally cross Shuteye Pass Trail off the list.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/14.jpg


On the ride out I checked out a couple moto trails heading south towards Whiskey Falls. The first one was rated green, and pretty nice.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/15.jpg


The second one was rated blue. I was wondering why because it was pretty flat and followed an old road bed. Then I got to this spot which dropped steeply down for 3-400ft. It was a bit sporty on the moto. 300lbs doesn't like to stop on debris covered slabs.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/16.jpg


Whiskey Falls

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/17.jpg


I took a different way out. Pretty nice roads and they were less burned than roads on the ride in. But they also had a bunch more vert along the way. Got back down just in time for sunset.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...akeMoto/18.jpg



A good day on the moto. I was stoked to find all the roads in good shape. And the forest up top was not badly burned for the most part, just a few pockets that got nuked. I think the fire was worse further north.

Here's something to distract from the political / election BS....


The ride was in late Sept, Bass Lake area.

I wanted to ride each of the three main trail networks around Bass Lake - Goat Mountain, Mary Jane/Willow Creek, and Shuteye Peak/Blind Squirrel/007. Looking at my to-do list though, I realized I was starting to run short on time for the trip. And I wanted at least half a day for Yosemite the next day. So I decided to take on the challenge of riding all three systems in one day. If you're bikepacking, that's what you'd be doing anyways, and without a shuttle.


I headed to the bottom of Goat Mtn just before sunrise. Orogenesis climbs up Spring Cove Trail and drops down Goat Mtn Trail. So that's what I did. Spring Cove is a stout climb of 850ft in 1.5mi, but almost all rideable.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/01.jpg


It didn't take long and I was at the top. I had ridden Goat Mtn before but not the Spring Cove Trail. Goat was fun as always and I saw no one given the early morning weekday start. At the bottom is an easy fire road pedal back to the truck. The ride only took an hour for 5.5mi and +/-1,000ft

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/02.jpg


Next I drove up to the north end of the lake and parked near the bottom of the ride. Orogenesis uses Mary Jane and Willow Creek Trails as descents, and Chepo Saddle OHV road as a climb for those heading north. I had never ridden Chepo before so this would be a loop as well.


It starts off as normal forest road and then hits a bunch of rock gardens and granite slabs for about 3/4 mile.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/03.jpg


The rock garden sections required hike a bike, otherwise it was mostly rideable.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/04.jpg


It took a couple hours to get up top where the singletrack begins. After eating my lunch I dropped into Mary Jane. Fun, flowy trail with a lot of granite.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kqeiORHsCo



At the bottom of MJ there is a cool alternate trail a couple big log rides that avoid wet stream crossings on the main trail.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/05.jpg



Next there is a steep hike a bike up a rocky jeep trail to reach the top of Willow Creek trail. Then you get a fun chunky descent.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhCWrZJC5eY


Lower down, the trail follows right along Willow Creek for a while with some big pools and waterfalls.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/06.jpg


Of course there can be tons of hikers heading to these. Fortunately I only saw a few people. On a weekend morning you'll be stopping often.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/07.jpg


This lap took 4 hours and was about 14mi with +/- 2,500ft. I still think MJ and Willow are a bit on the tough side for bikepacking but even though they are steep and rocky, they at least have a solid trail surface. Most riders should expect some downhill hike a bike with a loaded bike.



Next up, Shuteye Peak with a partial shuttle. Orogenesis doesn't go up Shuteye Peak but it does incorporate 007 Trail and Blind Squirrel. Those heading south will probably climb fire road instead of 007. We will have alternates for Blind Squirrel so you'll get to descend it whether you're heading north or south.


I had a solid 2,000ft climb up Shuteye Peak OHV 6S59 from where I parked. The first couple miles were pretty nice climbing, then it was on and off hike a bike the rest of the way up.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/08.jpg


It's a cool road to climb and I took plenty of breaks.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/09.jpg


And the views aren't bad. Looking north towards Yosemite

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/10.jpg


Made it up to the fire lookout.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/11.JPG


Dropped in without wasting any time. I rode the uppermost trail, Skyfall years ago, and it was a rutted, torn up mess at the time (it's a moto trail). But the Yosemite South Gate Trail Cooperative did a bunch of work on it in June this year and it is back. Still burly and loose, but really fun.

Near the top of Skyfall

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/12.jpg


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeAxKnncYts


Blind Squirrel is best riding in the area IMO. It's a huge granite playground with a MTB trail running through it. I've ridden it before and sort of know the lines, otherwise it would be hard to follow. Much of it doesn't have cairns so you're trying to spot tire tracks entering and exiting granite sections.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/13.jpg


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgpTAO8lfUc


There are three distinct slab sections separated by a bit of forest riding. By the time I got lower down, the sun was setting. Not a bad place to take that in!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/14.jpg


At the bottom of Blind Squirrel you pick up the Browns Creek ATV trail. After turning onto it I came around a corner to a cloud of dust. No humans around that I could tell, so I took chase


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufFklKUggcE


I've chased a bear down a forest road before on the moto (and couldn't keep up), but never on the bike! Super cool. He ended up on the switchback below but took off trail for good at the next corner.


After that I had the forest all to myself. I dropped down a forest road for a mile to Central Camp where I picked up the Fourth section of 007. Lots of people love 007 but the first three sections see the most traffic by far. I was just hoping there wouldn't be a bunch of deadfall. There wasn't, but it was slow going. Orogenesis uses 2/3 of Fourth and all of First, Second and Third.


Things sped up as I hit Third, and the trail gets better and better the further you drop. Second is very rocky. First (pictured) is a riot.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...LakeMTB/15.jpg


Finished the ride around 830pm. 22mi, +3,100 and -6,100ft. One of the best full days on the bike I've had in a long time.

Late Sept, Yosemite

I had some errands to run and admin to deal with in the morning, then I headed into Yosemite since mandatory reservations had ended for weekdays.



I made the drive over to Glacier View first. This is my favorite view in the park.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...osemite/01.jpg


Definitely not waterfall season. Some of them were completely dry. The others were barely flowing

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...osemite/02.jpg


They need this sign on the trails in Bass Lake. That bear the day before could have hurt itself in a wipeout.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...osemite/03.jpg


My original plan was to do a full day hike in the park. But getting here mid day when it was hot had me changing my mind on that. I headed down and did a hike on some of the valley trails instead.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...osemite/04.jpg


Compared to other times I've been here things were pretty quiet

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...osemite/05.jpg


Getting into golden hour I found a good swim spot and then checked out more of the views

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...osemite/06.jpg


Had to use the 30x zoom to spot these climbers on El cap. I showed this to a family that was hanging out who had no idea people could climb a wall like this. And then I mentioned they'd be setting up a hanging platform to sleep on up there :eek:

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...osemite/07.JPG


Definitely need to make time for some bigger day hikes or backpacking in Yosemite at some point.....

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...osemite/08.jpg

Late Sept, Yosemite area


I had never been, so I decided on a little side trip to check out Hetch Hetchy Reservoir before following the route further north. It's about 15 miles northeast of Hwy 120 on a winding, narrow paved road.

Shortly after the Yosemite NP entrance booth a car coming the other way flashed brights and motioned a speed trap up ahead. Huh? Sure enough, a NPS ranger was hidden off the road on a long straightaway. Then I passed another one further on. One section had reduced speeds to 20mph due to frequent bear crossings. It's a fun road to drive, I can see why people would want to haul ass. Not good for bears though. Getting hit by cars is the leading cause of death for bears in Yosemite.


There isn't much at Hetch Hetchy - a small campground and hiking/backpacking trailhead. And the reservoir. It's pretty scenic. Lots of good hiking from the looks of it. The hike I wanted to do goes out to top of the cliffs in the middle of the pic. But it's a full day hike so I'll have to wait for another time.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/01.jpg


The Tuolumne River spills out from the dam. It was hot out so I planned to swim in the river later.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/02.jpg


Heading back to the route I took Mather Road to Cherry Lake Rd. Looking down over the Tuolumne River. Kirkwood Bridge is out of sight down below.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/03.jpg


Found a good swimming hole near the bridge

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/04.jpg


Time to head north. Orogenesis crosses the Tuolumne River further west using the Lumsden Bridge, which has been closed to vehicle traffic for years. I rejoined the route where it turns onto FR 3N01. 3N01 is a pretty narrow forest road but really nice riding with mostly gentle grades.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/05.jpg


3N01 was in rougher shape than I remembered with some ruts and other water damage. Further north, the route turns onto 2N14 which seems to have been upgraded for logging truck traffic.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/06.jpg


Where 2N14 intersects 3N01 again the route turns on to a series of moto trails. I had never ridden these before, but planned to on this trip.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/07.jpg


As I passed by I checked to see if these trails had seen recent traffic. They had, which was a good sign

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/08.jpg


I needed to get up closer to Pinecrest that night and with available daylight I opted to re-scout a trail that drops down from Spring Gap. I'd have enough time to descend it before dark, but would have to pedal back up with lights. Unfortunately I never made it down. The area had been logged recently and once the trail entered the tree line it was covered in logging debris. It wasn't worth trying to continue.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/09.jpg


So that ride was a bust. I think that trail is too steep to be good for bikepacking, which is why I wanted to refresh my opinion of it. There aren't many alternatives aside from taking forest road.

The route follows Philadelphia Ditch (an active flume) getting to Spring Gap. It looked like there had been recent construction on it, so I rode along it for half a mile. It's all good to go

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/10.jpg


Water control facility at last light.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...etchyPC/11.jpg


The parts of the route I had driven were all in good shape. I really like this area for biking. The ridgelines are really long heading north-south and a lot of the roads contour along up high for long distances. Much nicer than other areas where they constantly drop down and climb back up.

Late Sept, Pinecrest area


I staged the self shuttle right from the ranger station in Pinecrest. The plan was to do a point to point starting with the moto trails from the day before. Then cross the Clavey River and head to Pinecrest the back way following the current Orogenesis route. There are some old hiking / equestrian trails that go all the way from Bourland Mtn to the pack station on Dodge Ridge. Then I'd hit the MTB trails that drop down to town. I had scouted all of this except for the moto trails a few years ago. A fire burned part of the back 40 in 2023, so who knows what condition the trails will be in now.


The first moto trail started off good. Then I ran into a few big downed trees. The trail finally disappeared into a mess of logging debris that had not been cleaned up. The second trail was better. Steeper, but lots of pavers were used to keep the trail from getting rutted.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/01.jpg


Crossing the Clavey River

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/02.jpg


The third moto trail started off as a road.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/03.jpg


After half a mile a singletrack turned off to the right. This was the best trail of the three, meandering trail with decent grades and nice tread. Part of the area had been logged but the trail had been cleared of debris.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/04.jpg


The route teed into a forest road and I turned right, dropping down and crossing the Clavey River again. Now the climbing begins...

The next couple roads used to be rutted out enough they would require high clearance. They've now been graded and were nice and smooth. I'm guessing they will be doing some logging here soon.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/05.jpg


I turned onto Rock Creek Road. This road was impassable to vehicles when I did this same ride a few years ago, with big logs laid across the road at the intersection and what looked like big piles of dirt and rock dumped to further block access. The road was well on its way to growing in.

This time, logs and deadfall had been cut out to ATV width and the road had been seeing some traffic. It's still rough, but I was able to ride all of it except for one loose rocky section.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/06.jpg


The road surface higher up. Great place to camp!

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/07.jpg


Turning onto Rock Creek Trail. Things were looking promising at this point.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/08.jpg


But any optimism soon faded as deadfall started began

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/09.jpg


This trail definitely flows better the other direction (when not covered in trees). Between the route finding, the deadfall and the rocky terrain I wasn't riding much at all.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/10.jpg


I was able to follow the first half of the trail. But this got harder the further on I got. About half mile before the Coffin Hollow intersection I lost the trail completely. It might as well have never been there.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/11.jpg


I spotted the trail sign for another intersection. But there was no trail in any direction to go with it. I stopped trying to follow the line on the gps and went cross country using whatever route looked easiest to pass through.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/12.jpg


I was able to find the Rock Creek/Coffin Hollow intersection and a few hundred feet of Coffin Hollow while it was up on a side hill. But then it dropped down into a flat area and the deadfall started again - big trees. I couldn't find any trace of the trail.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/13.jpg


It was getting into late afternoon and I made the decision to bail on the route. I didn't want to be searching for lost singletrack in the dark. There was still about 3 miles of unknown trail left to where I knew the trail would be good.

The map showed a forest road on a ridge above less than 1000ft away, and a "route" marked by cairns that leads up to it. I don't think I found the actual route but I did make it up to that road.

Unfortunately, it was just as bad or worse than what I'd been on. Covered in white thorn. So I just continued cross country straight up the slope hoping the road condition would improve on the switchback above. It did, and the further I went the better conditions got. I was finally able to ride.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/14.jpg


I got to an intersection with a well travelled forest road. The "sure thing" exit was a 10-mile pedal on forest roads to Dodge Ridge. The "bad decision" exit was one of two singletrack descents that were 1-2 miles the other way up the forest road. I went for option B. What could go wrong, dropping into a double black trail I've never ridden before, at last light?

Had to hunt around a bit but I found the first singletrack. It runs over the gap in the rocks on the left.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/15.jpg


If it looks like I'm about to drop off a ledge into darkness, that would sum up the trail pretty well.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/16.jpg


The trail was super janky up top and I walked a bunch of features. Then it transitioned into steep slabs and I was able to ride a lot more....as long as I could spot the next cairn in the darkness.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/17.jpg


I was out of water and came across this stream at the bottom of the descent. Stopped to filter some water. Fish seem to get stupid at night under bright lights. This one just hung out here and didn't know what to do. When I moved the light it finally took off and hid under a rock.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/18.jpg


The end of the trail got a bit confusing with some large slabs that were not well marked and then another logging area near the road. After a mile long climb up to the pack station I picked up the trail down Dodge Ridge for a happy ending of flowy singletrack goodness.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...veyToPC/19.jpg


Stats for the ride were 24mi, +3,600 and -3,700ft.

It was a bummer that Rock Creek and Coffin Hollow were in such bad shape. We can't send bikepackers on them in their current condition. Unfortunately there are not a lot of people doing trailwork in this area. These trails do not see much use as most hikers and horses head into the Emigrant Wilderness. Looking on the bright side this will force us to come up with an alternate route. None of the trails between Rock Creek and the pack station are very fun for bikes which is too bad because they make a perfect connection for Orogenesis. The few riders I know who have ridden/scouted them did not like them much.

Late Sept, still in Pinecrest area


The weekend was approaching so I had texted a friend about doing some riding. There was a birthday ride going on for a local guy and he invited me to join them.


Found a nice campsite fairly close to town but with a steep/rutted entrance that most campers would avoid (meaning the site was available). Perfect.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...yRidePC/01.jpg


It was a pretty good sized group of varying abilities and speeds. I cruised at the back of the pack.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...yRidePC/02.jpg


The ride was about 20 miles and 2800ft vert. I had ridden one trail before, the other two were new to me and really fun descents through the forest.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGkTU8IXW34


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4KyX-tFaAw



Found a nice swimming hole after the ride. Headed back to camp rather than ride/explore more.

https://www.habventures.com/photos/0...yRidePC/03.jpg