More Trail Riding with Yagi

Sunday, July 12

As I waited for the weekend crowds to go on back home and for the rolling RV and Boat Show on US 285 to reverse direction, I thought I'd do some more trail riding.  This time, I went north of Kenosha Pass via US285 (traffic was heavy) to explore these trails:

Martha clued me in a while ago about this app, very handy to find trails that allow motorcycles and finding your way around as it uses the phone's GPS to geo-locate you when you're not sure where you are.

I would end up riding all of FR811, most of FR123 and parts of FR810 as well.  These forest roads were accessed via Park County Roads 58 and 60.  Yagi could barely maintain 45 mph on the steep highway portions leading to/from Kenosha Pass, luckily traffic wasn't too heavy the times I was on the highway, mostly.

CR58 allowed access to FR811 from which I then turned onto FR811.A.  When exploring I always tend to make continuous right turns to try and cover most areas.  Eventually I turned right onto FR811.B, a narrow trail rutted deeply in spots which allowed me lots of practice at keeping the motorcycle going straight while riding on the side of a sloping trail!

Eventually, FR811.B meets up with FR123:

The pond I found feeds into nearby Lininger Lake

A bit further on, the road was submerged under water that came up to my knees.  How do I know that?  Because I decided not to proceed to where 811.B junctions with FR123 as I was riding alone.  I didn't want to drown the motorcycle you see.

I did take off my boots and put on my water/hiking shoes and then waded across, boy the water was cold!  After ascertaining the water was indeed right at knee level with a loose sandy/gravel bottom, I definitely decided not to chance it.  

As I walked through the water obstacle, I spotted this GoPro Hero camera underwater:

As you can see, it's been in the water a while, the lens is all scratched up and the casing is beat up.  I did recover a Micro SD card from it and soon as I can read it, I'll see if I can ID the owner who lost it probably doing a water crossing that didn't go well.

So I retraced my way back along FR811.B until I reached FR811.A, I turned right where it junctioned with FR810 which took me all the way back to the US 285 highway.  I wanted to check out FR123 regardless so I got on the slab and went further north until I could exit on CR60.

Took CR60 to this junction with FR123.

Before I turned off onto FR123, I had proceeded onwards for a few miles until I got to the entrance to Red Cone Pass Road.  Yagi hit reserve on its gas tank at this point and a combination of that and warning signs saying Red Cone Pass was for "experienced 4x4 drivers"; I decided to put off Red Cone Pass till I had done some more research.  Here's a video that shows the road pretty well:  Video Link

So, returning once again to the sign in the above pic, I rode the initially very technical FR123 (lots of big rocks and ruts) until finally reaching an area full of Jeeps and the drivers.  I continued onwards and eventually came to the portion where FR123 and FR811.B meet up.

By this point I had decided I'd walk Yagi across the submerged 50 ft or so of roadway.  I went to don my water/hiking shoes and one was missing!  Dammit!  I had placed both under the cargo netting behind me on the seat and apparently one worked itself free.

Losing the shoe wasn't a big deal, but the orthopedic insert inside was not inexpensive!

So, barefoot, I ferried my riding gear over first, then came back across (damn but the water was cold) and proceeded to push Yagi over to the other side.  About halfway there, my feet were hurting and I was getting tired as the loose sand/gravel on the bottom caused quite the drag on Yagi.

Looking down, I could see the water level not very close to the airbox so I fired up Yagi (had to pull the choke lever for some reason (engine got too cold perhaps?) but she finally caught and we slowly made our way to the other side.

I dried off and waited for feeling to return to my legs from the freezing water.  Then donned my riding gear and started retracing the route back to US285 that I'd done earlier, but this time much slower to be able to scan and look for the missing shoe!

No luck, got all the way to US 285 with no sign of the shoe.  I had to return to the campsite to get more gasoline for Yagi by this point.  So I delayed retracing the CR60 portion of the riding till after getting gasoline.

It started raining, off and on, as I rode back to camp.  Most of the campers were gone by the time I got to the URRV at 12:30PM.  So that was good news.  Got Yagi fueled up and rode back out.  I got off US 285 at the exit for CR60 and less than three miles later there it was!

17.4 miles from the campsite, there was my missing shoe!

As you can see, the skies weren't looking that great  so I turned around and rushed back to the campsite.  It started raining harder and the wind started blowing quite hard as I worked my way slowly on US 285 crawling up to the summit of Kenosha Pass and barely able to hold 50 mph on the way down due to the strong winds.

Finally turned off onto CR56 and away from the cager traffic.  The rest of the way was just rain, slick spots that looked dry but didn't offer the same traction as before.  Made it back to camp safely, oiled Yagi's chain due to all the water exposure today, and used the rest of the afternoon to recuperate.

The weather did improve once the storm clouds moved onwards.  By 4PM it was nice and sunny again with temperatures in the mid to high 60s!