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Published: July 19th 2018
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Day 14 From Red River Lodge we had around 10kms of gravel to return to the main road. Plenty of deer threatening to test our braking skills along this trail.
Back into Elk City on seal we refuelled & wondered about the instructions we had been given the day before by a local that to get to Red River Lodge we had to take a gravel road out of town??
After refuelling we had a winding sealed road alongside a fast flowing river with rapids every 100m. Past some modern gold slicing pumps which we stopped & viewed - the whole area was extremely interesting & scenic. After 20kms of this road we were into a gravel forestry road with warning signs that there were logging operations occuring. Shortly after we met a fully laden logging truck winding down the hill towards us. We rode into the bush on the side of the road to keep well clear.
Climbing once again we were soon up to 2470m our highest elevation so far. On the way up we encountered un-melted snow drifts once again. This section of the ride was as usual, winding, rocky, & a
bit dusty. By now we had started to understand the hand signals opposing 4wds or side by side drivers gave us. Number of vehicles behind the lead vehicle was indicated by the fingers the driver held up allowing us to be prepared and the final vehicle’s signal was a clenched fist. We were now returning the favour by running the same protocol.
Lunch time saw us at Burgendorf. This is an old hot springs resort with a café, hot pools & a group of cabins – all very rustic dating back to the mid 1800s. Some of the cabins were so rustic they had collapsed. After a quick lunch we took on some fuel where the pump guy told us it was 7 hours by 4wd to Yellow Pine which was our destination today. He thought, on bikes we should do it in 5 hours but in reality it took us just over 3 hours.
This 3 hour trip was much the same as we had been enjoying (rocks, ruts & dust) interspersed with some extra entertainment when Ian & Bryan came upon a Brown bear which quickly climbed a tree on the side of the road. If you are fleeing one don’t bother climbing a tree was the moral of this story.
As usual most of the way the road had amazing drop-offs & vistas & good views of the road below as it switch-backed 100s of metres down the hillside
Arriving in Yellow Pine we had to wait on the saloon porch for the lodge proprietor to arrive back from a trip to Boise. This town is obviously dying with nearly every business for sale including ones that had long since shut down. However to prove there is still life in the town, Bryan & I were having a beer on the porch when 2 locals had a heated argument which we thought could possibly develop into a gunfight in the dusty main street. Bryan & I were eyeing up the quickest route to safety inside the saloon. However things calmed down some when one of the protagonists got into his side by side & headed out of town in a cloud of dust.
We met Tom a local businessman who runs a horseback hunting enterprise. $US5000 -$7000 for 5 days hunting staying in pre-set up tents. For this you can hunt wolves (open season as they are a dangerous pest), moose (nearly all been wiped out by the wolves), mountain lion & anything else that moves.
We also met John who works for the Nez Pearce Indian tribe monitoring & recording Salmon populations. They also have a hatchery where they breed the salmon & then let them loose into the wild. The salmon are tagged & tracked & he has recently recorded one that has returned after he had originally tagged it in 2012.
All in all an interesting if not frightening evening completed by a meal in the saloon & then we checked into our lodge. Just unded 400kms today.
Day 16 Out of Yellow Pine immediately onto the ubiquitous windy gravel roads but not before another closs deer encounter -my turn this time Climbing on narrow forestry roads once again, we were among thousands if not millions of acres of burnt out pine forests for hours with some of the fires obviously quite recent.
Today's mechanical highlight for me was solving an ongoing missing/cutting out problem on my bike. My bike would cut out every time I stood up on a steep climb. Eventually after trying to think of every possible cause & solution I got Ian to ride my bike - he had no problem - however the same thing was happening on Ian's bike when I rode it. Mystery!!! However all solved when Bryan remembered that he had the same problem when riding his DRZ in Aus last year. If you stand with your heels tucked in you can catch the side stand cut out switch & cause the motor to cut out. Problem solved.
We climbed to a little over 2000m before turning onto an ascending then descending winding road that had been freshly graded. Unfortunately their method to stop rain water causing bad ruts in the road is on every slope to grade a culvert up to 18” deep across the road with a berm on the downhill side of the grading to channel water off to the side of the road. We had to mount the berm, drop into the culvert (or vice versa) on each one. There must have been at least a hundred of these so very slow going.
Reaching the small town of Lowman after a ride of around 170kms we branched off the BDR & headed for Boise where we have tyres ordered to be fitted on our rest day tomorrow. Coming into Boise we passed some still smouldering fires.
A total of just under 300kms today.
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