I even glimpsed blue sky at the top.
awesome pics, matty, I'm having fun looking for Breckinridge Road and Democrat Road on google maps! :thumbup:laughing
we went up to the Long Barn Lodge on the 18th, and the better air quality and blue sky was even more in evidence thanks to heavy rain in the area Friday morning, just in time for us ...
we love basing some of our ADV trips out of Long Barn because the Lodge has a pool and comfortable rooms and because it is under 160 miles and 3 hours from Lower Haight, according to google maps.
arty
know we've been having some fun n00bie ADV riding discussions here recently, so have included a couple of maps of some big-bike-suitable dirt roads/camping opportunities off Hwy 108 and east of Bridgeport:
Silver Creek Road is a worthy bypass of the beautiful asphalt on Hwy 108 ...
it's easiest to find the first time at the bottom, eastern, closer to Hwy 395 side, because you just ride up to the sentry on duty at the Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center and tell the guard you're heading to Sonora Pass on Silver Creek Road, and they will waive you through. simply head straight up the hill from the sentry post.
(it's pretty easy to find from the top, too, it is the first left you can make after Sonora Pass heading east ... you know you're on the correct road by the steep, short concrete creek ford the road goes through about a half mile up from Hwy 108.)
a pic up near the top of the FS road after you make a sharp left off Silver Creek Road coming up from the bottom. it's a little steep spur off to the right heading west/uphill once you get up on the tree-free ridge ...
that's Mt Patterson in the background, which also has a lot of easy fire-road dirt, as well as some more advanced high-clearance 4x4 roads up to the top at 11,000' or so ...
I've camped a bunch of times where the pic was snapped, killer sunrise views in the morning.
the other bit of easy dirt fire-road we did this weekend was east of Bridgeport, CA, toward Bodie ...
the map shows Aurora Canyon Road to Masonic-Bodie Road into Bodie. There is a ton of well maintained dirt roads with glorious views off of these two roads ... you can find the ghost town of Masonic and the radio tower up on Masonic Peak, and make your way to Lucky Boy Pass Road, the part of Aurora Canyon east of Bodie, etc.
a view to the WEST from the intersection of Aurora Canyon Road and Masonic-Bodie Road ...
Oakland Motorcycle Club member, Bungee Brent, was leading the dirt part of Saturday's ride and was kind enough to buy us the entry fee, so we could all walk around Bodie ... I'm usually too cheap to pay myself, so it was a wonderful treat.
The engaging ranger-lady gave us a talk on the history of the town and was also nice enough to offer to snap our pic ...
she also told me they'd fixed the wash out in the eastern part of Aurora Canyon Road and removed the abandoned vehicles. Some of you may
recall the problems I had there last year on the way to the BARF Hawthorne Rally ... :laughing
pic of a real truck for my Chevy bow-tie friends ... :toothless
We took Hwy 270 out of Bodie and at Hwy 395 my friend bananachunks discovered he'd spat the plug in his rear tire ... he just got back from a 3200 mile Continental Divide ride on his sweet Honda and soon had the problem fixed with the help of a very cool portable air-pump that's battery powered and shaped like a cylinder for ease of packing. It has a pressure gauge and you can set it to turn off automatically at the desired air-pressure. Decided I need one ... :gsxrgrl
one cool thing about Bungee Brent is he is a wonderful photographer ... some of you who do the OMC Sheetiron ride may remember being photographed by him in Ft Bragg ...
he brought all his photo gear and we got to watch on-bike video he had taken on our ride Saturday morning when we got home that evening in the ice skating rink which is free of ice in the summer and ready for a party ...
got to celebrate four September birthdays, while we were at it ... :bday
we were also able to watch this weekend's MotoGP race on Sunday morning before we slogged home (3.5 hours, 155 miles).
anyway, I love Hwy 108 for it's relatively easy access from San Francisco to lots of big-bike fire roads and munificent dispersed camping opportunities ...
our gang of street riders and dual-sporters before we parted ways at Hwys 108 and 395 on Saturday morning ... the street bikers headed off to Monitor Pass.
Bungee Brent does the Bungee Brent's Backwoods Bash every year out of the Long Barn Lodge, in June, I think, that annual rally has been a fun way for me to learn about the area over the years ... :afm199
arty