Evil Snow Releases My Quad!

[GrizzlyGuy]

I'm happy to report that yesterday I managed to extract my Grizzly from the Grizzly Den. My solar battery maintainer worked again this year (whew!) and she is all prepped and ready to go with improved survival gear (since I am incapable of repairing anything if I break down).

I was going to do a ride today out by Bear Valley and maybe over to the Boca/Verdi Peak area so I could give you guys a snow/trail report. But it's raining and I'm a wimp who hates riding in the rain.

Oh well, maybe tomorrow. My guess is that getting up above 7000' won't be possible yet.

[Kodiak]

sweeeeet cant wait to hear the report

[EigerMike]

great to see your still around!

[hellcat650]

I'm happy to report that yesterday I managed to extract my Grizzly from the Grizzly Den. My solar battery maintainer worked again this year (whew!) and she is all prepped and ready to go with improved survival gear (since I am incapable of repairing anything if I break down).

I was going to do a ride today out by Bear Valley and maybe over to the Boca/Verdi Peak area so I could give you guys a snow/trail report. But it's raining and I'm a wimp who hates riding in the rain.

Oh well, maybe tomorrow. My guess is that getting up above 7000' won't be possible yet.

Hey GG, i went up HTL trail from boomtown Sunday 5/30/10 and ran in to impassable snow drifts below the radio tower. I never figured drifts would still be that bad that low. Let me know when you go riding boca area.

[GrizzlyGuy]

Thanks Mike, yes I'm still alive! I've been avoiding this place because I figured it would be too depressing hearing about everyone riding while we still have Arctic conditions and I'm track-less.

Holy cow Hellcat, I figured that it would have melted out by now over there! That ridge gets a lot less snow than we do. Then again, that road going up from Boomtown is on a north-facing slope, so that stuff will melt last.

The NE-facing ridge here at the house (7100-7800 ft) is solidly covered in snow and people are still skiing it daily. But the south-facing one at the same elevation is almost entirely melted. Today I walked the dog around a small round hill at about 7000, and the south side was snow free while the north side was still solidly packed. I'm up for Boca anytime, but I suspect the shady spots will still have some big drifts.

Have you heard anything about Henness Pass Road? I might need to rethink my scouting trip, I was hoping to "sneak up" on the Boca area by taking Henness Pass west from 89. But it could still have drifts on it even down in the flats, who knows.

[hellcat650]

I bet heness pass will be clear from 89 to verdi ridge. IT runs mostly east west and gets more sun. I think there will some major mud bog action along the way with all the melting snow. I know that stretch along the big meadow with fencing just north of stampede will be muddy all the way.

[Kendo]

I was up there on Sunday and didn't run into any snow. We rode up from Henness Pass @ Stampede Rd, thru Dog Valley, around the base of Peavine, down the hills above Cabelas and back. Great ride, except for the a'holes at the CA border that think it's necessary to gate the trail off because of their dumbass mine.

I think Verdi Peak is out of the question right now. Looks like quite a bit of snow at about the 7k level and above. Maybe in a couple of weeks.....

[GrizzlyGuy]

Great info, thanks guys! It's raining cats and dogs here so I think I'll have to postpone the ride. Even if it stops raining the roads will probably be 'mud bogs' like HellCat says and I don't want to rut them up.

Hey Kendo, did that gated trail look anything like this one:





I shot those a few years ago when the buttheads that I was going to ride with left early and this is what their Boca camp looked like 10 minutes before we were supposed to meet there {crickets chirping}:



Yo HellCat: Can you ride on Monday? Angelo has that day off so maybe we could get together and do the Boca/Dog Valley/Peavine area like Kendo did.

[Kendo]

Worse!!

There was an actual gate and fence running all along the CA/NV border. Something like that I may have considered riding over. When we encountered the gate, we were 25 miles in, getting tired and not too anxious to backtrack. Unfortunately, it was our only real option though.

I can send my tracks to you if you want. At least you'll know where NOT to ride.

[GrizzlyGuy]

Dohh!! That sucks Kendo.

Yes, I'd love to have those tracks. My GPS map is sparse in that area and I still don't know exactly how you go to make it onto Peavine. Knowing the way not to go would be a big help.

[Kendo]

OK Eric, here ya go. If you need/want it in GPX I can do that too. You'll notice where the trail abruptly stops at the border, that would be the fence line. You'll also ntice we attempted to ride until the fence ran out - to no avail.

There's a gnarly hill climb or two in there too, but you can skip those if you want, there are other ways around.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3085378/DogValleyPeavine.kml

Oh and we start from the end of Stampede Rd where it T's into Henness Pass. Nice free camping area there.

[GrizzlyGuy]

Cool! GPSBabel is crashing on me when I try to convert your file to GPX. If you can kindly upload it in that format it will be much appreciated.

EDIT: Never mind on the GPX format, the online converter over at GPSVisualizer.com did a bang-up job on the conversion.

[hellcat650]

Yo HellCat: Can you ride on Monday? Angelo has that day off so maybe we could get together and do the Boca/Dog Valley/Peavine area like Kendo did.



Hey G,
I work m-f. Did you guys go. If not let me know and maybe we can go.

[GrizzlyGuy]

We did go and had a lot of fun, see here. Hellcat, you need to give up working and become a bum like me, it's cramping your style!

[QMaze]

Wheres the Grizzly Den?