Day 3

 Stats: 194 Miles; 9:55 moving time; 20,321 vert ft climbing

When the light filled the world around me, I was in wonder of how cool of a place I had camped.  The on and off drizzle made packing up camp a bit of a challenge. The first descent reminded me of some of my local Colorado trails.  At the trailhead I realized I hadn't been consuming any of the instant coffee I was hauling around, so I stopped and made some adjustments while enjoying this cold coffee in the Hydrapak flask I brought for just such an occasion. This is a great minimalist trail coffee setup, no longer will I haul around a stove just for coffee!

Soon I encountered my favorite phenomenon: a singletrack gate that exists just to exist, a nod that even though your already on a motorcycle trail, only motorcycles shall pass through this gate.  The ridge was surrounded by more white granite peaks.

The roads through Warm Lake were very scenic. I hopped on Burnt Log trail worried by the dead forest at the start, however I was impressed by the amount of saw work to keep this trail going.  There was one surprise I had not seen, someone left a tree with a kickstand, a sort of dirt bike limbo to get past.  The dreaded river crossing at the end lived up to the hype, it took me what felt like 20 minutes to cross navigating all of the massive holes.  I've since learned there is a trail extension that bypasses this crossing which I'll be taking next time, though I feel this was a right of passage.  Nervous for time and having read pessimistic condition reports for the next trail, Bear Riordan, I decided to take roads to Yellow Pine, a town I was excited to visit.

The ride into Yellow Pine was breathtaking, giant healthy trees lined the well maintained road.  My excitement ended as soon as I entered town to find every business was permanently closed...except the awesome East Fork Cafe food truck at the edge of town.  The food was great, there was some funny horses who were making a team effort with their tails to keep the flies off each others faces.  They had WiFi and I was able to confirm both shops in McCall didn't have a front brake line, so I ordered one from RM ATV to the USPS in Wallace where my second oil change shipment was.  The food truck was able to call a fuel truck to come gas up my bike.  The guy was very friendly and had ethanol free 91, however it was $9 a gallon.  I filled all of the way up and had the truck driver confirm the water spigot behind the city monument was indeed safe to drink as the locals suggested.

The amazing views continued as I left Yellow Pine.  I crossed a bridge for the South Fork of the Salmon River and hopped on the Fitsum Creek trail, I couldn't find any conditions reports for this trail.  It started out great, a well maintained shelf trail a hundred feet up from the river in spots.  There were several recently cut down trees which inspired my optimism. My luck ran out only a couple miles in where the trail had a very small landslide.  While I could have find a way across this 4 foot long gap with only a 6 foot slide down to the river, I walked across to find no new tracks which had me question the last time anyone rode or cleared this trail.  I managed to push my bike back up from the slide and get it turned around, glad I at least rode to that spot. 

The views from the road to the next trail were some of the rockiest mountains I've ever seen.  I had to triple check my GPS when getting on the "Twenty Mile" trail as the trailhead and quality of the conditions screamed hiking trail, so I rode with extreme caution until the first split when the trail grew into dirt bike characteristics.  There was an interesting Honda Trail 90 abandoned in a rocky section here.

I intentionally only studied trail conditions and not difficulty, wanting to make the judgement for myself. The Victor Creek trail starts right off of a paved road, how hard can it be?  Going Northbound, the climb had some short slightly difficult rocky climbs but nothing notable, but once you summit the party starts!  Going down this was the most difficult public trail I've ever found. There was no specific crux but the theme was steep loose rocky soil over big rock faces with switchbacks before and after.  I took a minute more than once on the descent to gather my thoughts.  Victor Creek is a proper trail! Once at the bottom of the descent the trail changes into a dense jungle, a terrain I've rarely experienced on a motorcycle.  From here I took Ruby Meadows which was a dreamy flow trail reminiscent of Colorado which brought me close to Burgdorf Hotsprings. 

I wanted to get a splash of gas to be safe not knowing how little I had burned since filling up, and I wanted to scout out the hot springs for a future dual sport trip with Erin.  The property is amazing, endless historic cabins and a picturesque manmade set of pools.  I was so tempted to call it a night there but I wanted to be at the USPS right when they opened at 9 the next morning in Riggins. I also decided since I was going to get to Riggins at a decent time I should call and get a room there before it was too late.  I reserved a room with late check in at the Riggins Motel.  

Nethker trail provided a few more medium enduro moves on its rugged hill climb to Bear Pete trail.  Bear Pete was a classic ridgeline Idaho trail which brought me to a dirt road with endless switchbacks down to the Salmon River where wau too much asphalt leads to Riggins.  There was many boaters/campers enjoying the small beaches on the Salmon and I was questioning if I should have just done that instead of a motel since it was so nice out.  I had given myself the forced asphalt speed limit of 42 MPH to keep my mousses in good shape for the trip when on asphalt (55 mph on dirt).

Riggins was an awesome town, in the most positive way it felt like life was 20 years ago.  Worried about businesses closing early I went straight to the only open restaurant, the Seven Devils Saloon and had some great food and a local craft stout.  The restaurant was full of true cowboys.  By the time I left the grocery store was closed so I went to my hotel to unpack and watch the final motocross race replay on TV.