Day 3 - Kemmerer, WY [under construction - pics coming]

A quick breakfast and coffee at the Busy B was had, and we left Kemmerer under gray skies to the north, on Rt. 233. A couple or three miles up the road, and it turned to dirt. The road eventually became CR305, and followed the Hams Fork River, and a few miles later, we passed Viva Naughton Reservoir and plunged into the Bridger-Teton National Forest.

An reasonably preserved ranger cabin from the old days of horseback, cattle rustling, overgrazing and gold mining.....

 

As we continued up the valley, we reached the headwaters of the Hams Fork River, and then climbed west over the top of Hams Fork Ridge and dropped into Basin Creek Valley. Deer and antelope were plentiful, and many young ones were ambling along close to mom. Snowcapped peaks were in the distance, and we knew we were headed that way.

The ridgelines are running more or less north-south, and we're heading more or less west, so we roll over one ridge, drop into a valley, then cross the next. As we approach the climb to the next ridge, we spot a waterfall. Or is it? We ride on over and park the machines - we needed a bit of a break anyway. Turns out that this is Big Spring, a significant flow of very cold water that feeds into the west fork of Hams Creek. As it turns out, this road was part of the California/Oregon Trail, and as many as 350,000 settlers passed through here a century ago. It's now known as the Big Spring Backway and starts at Kemmerer and terminates in Cokeville. Who'd have known? Our complete and total lack of route planning is really beginning to pay off nice dividends. A cool drink from the boil, and we're off again. We don't need fuel yet, so we bypass Cokeville, and head north on an unnamed road (later we found out it was called Dry Fork Road). As we head further north, the road becomes more narrow and heavily rutted from those insistant on negotiating the road when wet. The 950's gobble up this sort of terrain. We ride north on this road for perhaps 25 miles or so, back into the aspens and higher altitudes. Eventually, Dry Fork Road intersects with Smiths Fork Road, and continues north, climbing to about 9500 feet. There was snow at the top - and this was on a more or less southerly exposure. As we started down the north side towards Labarge guard station, the snow drifts across the road began.

When we reached the snow drifts, 'Chollo and BigDog stopped, turned, established a quorum, created a transportation authority, adopted an agenda, and cyphered a plan. All before I even rolled to a stop. As I pulled up, they were both already looking at me. In an instant, and before I was even aware of their evil plans, I was volunteered to be the crash test dummy, to see if the route could be negotiated. I went, as ordered - what else could I do?. There were ruts pushed through the banks by a 4WD vehicle at an earlier time, which had refrozen into what could best be described as a trap. Where it wasn't icy, it was slick and muddy. I made it on through and rode a few miles, already deciding we were going forward and not turning back. So I rode back up the hill through the ice, snow and mud, saddled up the two Directors of the newly formed Bridger-Teton Transportation Authority, and rode back down the hill again. They wanted to apply for some DOT grants and commission a three year feasibility study, but we clearly didn't have time for such beaurocratic inefficiencies. There were roads to ride. We regrouped by the Labarge guard station, named after the famous (infamous ?) trapper Joseph Labarge who worked these rivers a century prior along with Jim Bridger and Zacharias Hams. Rumors abound regarding the plight of LittleDog whilst negotiating the snow. With a wheel diameter of perhaps 7/8", his efforts would need to be nearly superhuman. Will we ever see him again? BigDog, undaunted by LittleDog's morasse, continues north into the Poison Meadows and the Greys River Valley.

As we fired up the bikes and followed after BigDog, I was wondering how 'Chollo kept that R1200Gs so clean. BigDog's and my 950's looked like the 1st place and runnerup sows at the mud-wallerin' contest. As we meandered north along the Greys River, the traces of snow above the treeline on the eleven-thousand foot foot slopes of Mount Coffin reminded me how rugged and unforgiving this place could be. We'd not seen a soul for hours. There's no one out here but the three of us, and the bears, mountain goats, elk and deer...... As the time wiled away, we were suddenly reminded that we weren't the only people on Earth, as we came across the Forest Service's mag chloride application operation, spreading that vile salt in an effort to mitigate the dust to appease the weekend warriors. Who vote. Perhaps the only good thing (in a selfish way) that comes from this is that the local denizens view the experience as a gigantic seasonal salt lick, as evidenced by this moose mom and her calf, whom were busy sampling the road's seasoning. This stuff is as slick as owl crap on a wet slate roof when damp, so beware. Despite that sobering thought, the scenery continued to provide that awe we so badly craved. Yep, the ol' US of A is one big, empty and beautiful place, if you take the time to look around a bit.

Mag chloride sucks, but calcium chloride is worse. When we get through this, we need to hose these pigs off before corrosion sets in. It was mid-afternoon when we eased out of the forest and into Alpine Junction. To our surprise, there's a KTM dealer there - but we didn't need anything for the bikes, nor BigDog's Toro weed whacker. We stopped in a cafe for lunch, and the wheels sort of fell off the day. By the time we ate, it was 1600, and there was nothing up the road for quite a ways, except for Jackson Hole, and none of us wanted to even go there. Too many people. BigDog and I have plowed through about a thousand miles already, and a short day on the trail was just fine by us. After a bit of diligence, we snagged ourself a room. We also found a car wash to spray off the mag chloride, and then did a little chain maintenance. And then had a couple beers and chatted with our buddy Carlito, the tile layer in the room next door. We sat out on our 'porch', our laundry drying, as a massive boomer approached over the mountains from the west. Sipping a beer, and watching the lightning was relaxing as anything could be for me. We only did about 160 miles today, but the quality of those miles was kinda nice.

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