July 21-28, 2013 – Wyoming, Summer Ride (Part 3)

Our next stop is Adventure Riding in Wyoming.

 

Our friends Kris and Bill’s place in Star Valley is picture perfect. 

 

Rolling hay fields, 2 houses by the highway,

a creek meandering through the place with a swimming hole, a beaver pond, numerous rustic out buildings,

a big red barn which houses the toys, motorhome and a 3 bedroom home all with plenty of parking for their many friends and our big rigs.

 Our rig

We fit 7 big motorhomes (36-40’), a truck & camp trailer and two Van campers all near the barn.   We came from all over the West; Washington, Oregon, California, Idaho, Arizona, Utah and Colorado.

Bikes live in the barn at night

Pot luck suppers are a daily occurrence

One night we went to visit the neighbors for a dessert pot luck and campfire.

 The line up to taste Cindy's pies

Mexican train, anyone???

Most of the rides from Star Valley are Adventure rides. I have been calling these dual sport rides, but my friend JD has started calling our Suzuki's Sport Adventure bikes, and I guess that is a better description than dual sport.  After all, dual sport implies that some trails are involved.  We did ride some ATV trail, but no single track, so I’ll try to make the switch!!

 Monday was our first ride

We started with a large group, 12 riders and 11 bikes; Richard, Vicki, Jim, Victor, Dave, Wayne, Willard, Bob S., Larry, myself and Maria who was riding 2 up with her husband Rainer. Our host Bill waited for the last couple to arrive from Oregon, Bob and Cindy who were to arrive at any moment.  We left with Rainer in the lead, and headed south on county roads to by pass the town of Afton as much as we could.  We eventually joined Highway 89 and went south until we entered the National Forest and then took a left on Smiths Fork Rd. We eventually got on the Emigrants Trail which we took around Mt Thompson and through Snyder Basin. We followed Coal Creek for a while until we got to FS 46 which took us over to the Middle Piney Rd.  Then it was up to Middle Piney Lake for lunch.

Middle Piney Lake

By the time our last member made the turn onto the Middle Piney Rd, our other 3 riders had caught up and joined us.  I hear they took a short cut and rode like the wind to do it!!!

After lunch we headed back to Forrest Service Road FS46 which took us through various drainages and down to FS 50 which is a connector road over to North Cottonwood Rd.

Cool rocks

Today was all car roads

The views were wonderful

North Cottonwood Rd took us over to the Greys River Rd, which took us through Black Canyon and down to Alpine.  After a stop for gas, we headed south on Highway 89 to Eton.

 Ice cream stop in Eton

From there it was a quick scoot on the highway and county roads back to Bill's place.  It was a total of 187 miles and a beautiful day!

On Tuesday the girls went into Afton to hike and have lunch.  We started at the Intermittent Springs.  When the water table is low enough, this spring only releases water every 15-20 minutes. This results in the creek below it drying up between times.

 

 Cindy and Blanche

Vickie and Beth

We thought this was the right time of year to see the creek dry up, but apparently not... 

Yes that's the trail

 Cindy off ahead of us

On Wednesday we went on another ride. Bill warned us that there was an ATV trail that was very loose, rocky and steep.  I decided to take the DRZ anyway. After all, we won’t know what to expect on our coast to coast ride next summer, so I should take it everywhere.

Eleven of us started out, Bill in the lead followed by Cindy, Bob C, Wayne, Dave Bob S, Larry, Victor, Richard, Jim and me.  We began by heading north on Highway 89 until we got to the town of Thayne where we headed west into Idaho. The route took us on the Tin Cup Highway (SR 34) to Tin Cup Road past a place called Mosquito Ranch.  Glad I don’t live there!  From there we followed some forest roads and then up the ATV trail.

 

View from the road above Mosquito Ranch

 

 

Waiting for our turn

Cindy had some issues in the shale

 Wayne finds a route around, It worked so good that I followed behind him and didn’t have any issues

 

Bob S and Cindy waiting for the rest to get to the top 

 First lunch

After the hill we worked our way down to a creek crossing for a rest and what some were calling first lunch. After that we went through more forest roads and around Caribou Mountain to our next rest stop, an old mining site.  Rumor has it the mine owner was very broke at the end and couldn’t pay his workers.  Lucky for him an avalanche (some say he created it with dynamite) roared down the mountain and killed a lot of the workers.  As most of them were Chinese no one really looked in to it. That was typical of that era in the mining camps.

 

The group at second lunch at the mine

  Victor, Bob C, Bill and Bob S with the valley in the background.

Then it was back through the forest to Caribou City, to read some information signs (we try to be educated!!) and then a quick scoot down to the Palisades Reservoir and Highway 89.  Once again we stopped at Etna for ice cream.  It was a shorter day, just 102 miles, but what a great day!

Thursday was another rest day for some of us.  The ladies took a walk around Bill’s place checking out the beaver pond and creek, then hiking up the hill next door.  We admired the view, the butterflies and Cindy found a skull from some kind of canine, fox we think. 

Cindy, Vicki and Blanche looking at bones

Some of the boys went for a trail ride.  Wayne and Victor came home first, letting us know that Rainer had gone down hard and dislocated his shoulder. Dave and Richard stayed with him, helping him get out to a road. Victor took Rainer’s wife Maria in his van to pick Rainer up and take him to Jackson WY to the hospital. It was late by the time Dave and Richard got back, but even later for the 3 that went to Jackson, I think it was about 4 am by the time they got home. Not a good day for any of us.

Friday was the last planned ride. Bob C, Cindy, Larry, Bob S, Willard, Jim, Dave Wayne and I followed Bill back south through Afton and Smoot to the Smiths Fork Rd.  This time we stayed more to the south and followed dirt and two track roads through the forest and into the farm lands of Smiths Fork Creek.  We popped out onto US 30 at Cokeville, where some of us got gas. We stayed on the highway a short ways until we passed SR 89, and entered Idaho. We took a left onto a county road which followed the train tracks, crossing back and forth several times.  We eventually left the tracks behind and wound our way through the hills until we crested the top and were rewarded with a view of Bear Lake.  Bear Lake is huge and is half in Utah and half in Idaho.  

 

  

Bear Lake 

My camera doesn’t do the color of the water justice; it is very blue, almost iridescent. Absolutely beautiful! After admiring the view we headed down to the Bear Lake Hot Springs for first lunch.

We are a motley crew….

After eating we headed around the lake to St. Charles where the rest of us topped off our gas tanks. Then it was off onto forest roads that followed wandering creeks and worked our way west.  We headed to the ATV trail that was on our route, one that Bill said was going to be ‘a pleasant 10 mile roll along through the woods’.  We should have known better. The first hint of what was to come was at the start, a creek crossing that was lined on the near side with boulders that were all under water and not touching each other.  In other words: a perfect place to catch a front tire. 

Which is what I did. 

But I jumped off my bike and picked up that heavy pig all by myself; got it started and proceeded to bull-dog it across. 

I was not the only one to get completely wet there.  Once we were all across some of us rested and dried out while some of the others headed out ahead of us.  Bill’s favorite line the rest of that day was “As I recall…”  As in “As I recall, this trail is a sweet little scoot through the trees”. We stopped believing him because the next section we all grouped up at was a rocky, knarly uphill section.  By the time I got to it there was a line.  Wayne was on his way walking down, so I just gave him my bike and let him take it up. It wasn’t the only bike he rode up. I found out later that when he got there, he went up one of the rocks and his bike coughed and died; he went “ahhhhhh” as he toppled over. So he knew I didn’t want to try it.

 

Why do they always have to get the cameras out at a place like this?

After picking up her DRZ, Cindy clutched the crap out of it and made the hill!!

After that hill, we all needed to rest!

The trail really was sweet, most of the way.

After we got off the ATV trail, we meandered over to this canyon that I thought was a box canyon.  I could not figure out how we were going to get to the top, I could not see a road.  But up we went gaining more than 2000 feet over the next five miles.

Here I come zooming up the German Dugway. This is much steeper than it looks

The next stop was the Paris Ice Caves.  As it was a very hot day we all appreciated going into the cool cavern.  You entered in on a board walk past frozen water.

 

Jim after coming through the entrance

Wayne and I, relaxing and snacking again. 

The crew, spread out, enjoying the cool temperatures

  The main cavern is behind that huge rock at the top/right of the group photo. You had to almost crawl to get into it, too much work for most of us. Hey, it was a long day by this time. This would be a 10 hour, 224 mile ride!!  From here, it was out to the pavement in Paris, then on to Montpelier ID. We had one more stop to make.

You guessed it; we had to have ice cream!

From Montpelier we headed out US 89 to Crow Creek Rd.  We took this county road all the way back to Afton, where we went north to Bill’s place. 

Star Valley Wyoming

It was a long, but wonderful day.  I loved that ride.

During our stay in Wyoming Wayne finally made a decision about what bike he wants to take on the cross country ride next year.  Now we are looking for a DRZ for him.  But we didn’t have to look far as Bill has one for sale.  Yeah, Wayne has a bike! Now we have to figure out how to get it.  We are full up in the trailer, plus the bike is actually in Logan Utah.  So plans are made for us to continue on our way and then once we get back to Idaho City and our truck, we will drive to Logan to pick it up.

On Saturday folks began to break camp and head to their respective homes.  We left on Sunday and went as far as Idaho Falls where we spent the night at Travelers Park which offers free camping for one night.

Our campsite

The park had a walking trail next to the Snake River

A crane stands guard, of what, I do not know

After completing some errands, it was time to head back to Idaho City.  It has been a great Summer Ride.  It is always fun to see our friends and ride like crazy.  I can’t wait now for the Fall Ride to start!!! Yes, we do this again in September!!!!