1 reply to this topic

[craig333]

Friday after work I went up to Auburn to watch the motorcycle races. After the race if figured, hey I'm already this far, might as well head over towards Foresthill and find a place to camp. I meant to head south from there but somehow I wound up on the foresthill divide road. At night I didn't really notice just how much I was climbing until I hit the snow. When the road narrowed to one lane I figured I better turn around. I couldn't find a decent place to park until I came to the China Wall OHV staging area. As it turned out this was perfect. I was the only one there. Not enough snow for the snowmobilers and the forest roads are closed until the 25th. Really nice view from there too. Not to mention its got a nice restroom.

Leaving I saw a sign for sugar pine reservoir (something like that) and since I didn't even know there was one I headed over that way. Nice little lake. Sign at the dam said it was constructed in 2003 which explains why I'd never heard of it.

From here you can head on over to Iowa Hill and Colfax, if you don't mind the road sign that says "warning, primitive road, not suitable for towing, large vehicles" and some such as that. While its paved its really a one lane road. If you meet another vehicle its stop and squeeze by. Iowa Hill is at the top of the hill. Has a nice cemetary and a store. Other than some houses thats it. It was a mining town that pulled in over 20million in gold in its hey day. Miners must be completely insane as the effort to get here in the old days would have been something. The road going downhill to the North fork of the American River is a mere 15% grade and still one lane. I saw some hard core bicyclists going up.

A lot of people down at the river, most looked they were rafters. Saw an FWC on a Toyota there. The rest of the road going in to Colfax was a little wider, but not much.

All in all it was a pretty interesting trip through some country thats relatively close to home, but an area I was unfamiliar with. No pics as I didn't take the camera since I hadn't planned on traveling.

[SunMan]

Sounds fun Craig. Sometimes the unplanned trips are the best ones.