Bull Trout Lake

[drooling piston]

A few of us are planning a trip, from western Washington, to the Bull Trout Lake area, over Labor Day weekend and the following week.

We have never ridden this area.

 

We have the Bill dart maps.

Where is a good place to pick up this years MVUM maps on a Saturday?

Can u recommend a gps based map app to use on a smart phone?

 

Are there any fires, or other things, in that area we should watch out for?

 

I would like to see a weather forecast for that area. What is the closest area or town that I can find a forecast for on the weather channel app? I did find a forecast for Lowman and for Stanley, they show about 10 degrees difference between them. I don’t know which is closer in elevation or weather patterns?

 

Are there any locals that want to be a tour guide during that time?

 

Thanks!

[Schmidthead]

Try NOAA, the national weather service can pinpoint your forecast and give you info for hazardous conditions.

Try: forecast.weather.gov

See here: https://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lon=-115.25266914220992&lat=44.295779372397845#.W3tx5OS0XRY

 

 

[Justheman80]

I use Avenza also known at PDF Maps as an app on my phone/tablet.  You can down load the MVUM within that apps map store.  This is all free. 

https://www.fs.usda.gov/detail/boise/maps-pubs/?cid=stelprdb5053223  This web page will have great info The MVUM and the Avenza app.

also look at this map as well.  https://trails.idaho.gov/ 

[Justheman80]

I would go off of the Stanley weather.   But I too use the NOAA map mentioned above, you can have it pin-point exactly where you are staying.

[drooling piston]

Thanks for the suggestions!
I already have the Avenza app so that link will make it easy to download the correct map.

[Dave Wood]

Good rider's can ride all the trails in that area in one day. Excellent riding before the wildfires in that area. Lot's of dead/burnt tree's require a chainsaw. New downfall likely. I usually camp, near Stanley on multi day rides and drive out to Bull Trout for a day ride. Or do a Big Loop from Stanley Lake or Valley Creek over to Blue Jay, Ten Mile, Wapiti, Kirkham, link, Warm Springs, Bench and Wyoming.

[Mudd94]

https://trails.idaho.gov

[Dave Wood]

Wildfire started a couple days ago near Grandjean. Wapiti trail closed. Ten mile and Blue Jay are part of this loop. Likely closed too? Did not look at closure order yet?

[Justheman80]

How was your ride?  Trail conditions?  Pics?

[drooling piston]

Good rider's can ride all the trails in that area in one day. Excellent riding before the wildfires in that area. Lot's of dead/burnt tree's require a chainsaw. New downfall likely. I usually camp, near Stanley on multi day rides and drive out to Bull Trout for a day ride. Or do a Big Loop from Stanley Lake or Valley Creek over to Blue Jay, Ten Mile, Wapiti, Kirkham, link, Warm Springs, Bench and Wyoming.

You were absolutely right about the lack of trails in the Bull Trout area and some of the southern stuff is closed due to the Wapity creek fire.
The camping was beautiful and we were very entertained watching the Osprey and bald eagles diving into the lake to catch fish.
We packed up Tuesday morning, drove into Stanley for breakfast, supplies and decided to head a little west
We found a wide spot along Yankee Fork road, (between Sunbeam and the Bonanza camp), that is right along the river.
Yesterday, after getting camp set up again, we thought we would do a “little loop” up silver creek, to the Custer look out and back down Ramey creek.
That ride definitely had some pucker factor for me!!

Right now, We are sitting at the Basin Butte look out.
It has strong enough cell signal to do this post.
Loving the scenery and these trails today.
Pictures will have to wait till I get back home, which will be Sunday, so it will be some time next week.

[drooling piston]

I am sure glad I downloaded a geocached map!
The fires in this area burned up most of the trail marker sticks/signs so it would be really hard to know where u are just looking at a paper map. As it is we had to do a best guess which direction to go, stop in a mile and see if the GPS agrees that u are now headed in the direction u wanted to go.

[drooling piston]

Here are some pictures from our trip.

The drive along hywy 21 was pretty and scenic.

I don't know the name of this little lake, we turned off hywy 21 toward Bull trout lake and found this lake on the left. We camped on a little peninsula that tried to divide the lake.

The trails were fun mountain single track, but as mentioned above, there is only enough trail miles for 2-3 days of riding without repeating the same ride again.

this was the view from under my awning, at camp

our camp

an Osprey diving into the lake to get a fish for dinner

scenery along hywy 21

as we were taking a break here to cool off, we wondered what this area is like in the spring melt off times

playing ladder ball after dinner

Edited September 21, 2018 by drooling piston

[drooling piston]

We moved base camp for the second half of our trip. We drove through Stanley where we dumped the waste tanks, got fresh water, fuel and breakfast.

Once we turned up the road from Sunbeam toward Bonanza we saw this sign

We camped at this spot along the road, right next to the river.

This was one of the trail sections that gave me some pucker

Look at the top of the tallest peak, the little white spot is the fire look out building

we rode through a lot of standing, burned, dead trees. My old welders eye sometimes had a hard time being able to tell, in advance, is that black stripe on the trail, just a black shadow on the ground or another black, downed tree we had to hop over.

this was called handyman lake

a 1940s era gold dredge that worked up this Yankee fork of the river

The old mining town of Custer. They call it a ghost town but it felt more like a museum area. There is old equipment, like you see on the left and old buildings on both sides of the road. All had little posts with signs telling you about what you were looking at. 

We really enjoyed our trip!

 

ON the way out, somewhere between Bull trout and Lowman, I had an issue with the trailer, the rear axle caught up to the front axle and let the tires rub, making a bunch of smoke.

The leaf spring broke. I had to leave the trailer along side the road, first I drove about 40minutes back to Stanely to get cell phone signal, then drive over 100 miles (not on 70mph freeway) to Boise, to get a new spring, drive back to the trailer 100 miles, install the spring pack, then resume the drive home.

its all part of the experience. who is in a hurry to get home anyway?

Edited September 21, 2018 by drooling piston

[Slackkinhard]

1 hour ago, drooling piston said:

 were taking a break here to cool off, we wondered what this area is like in the spring melt off times

 

Looks like a great ID trip. I missed out this year...maybe next. 

This is what goes down in those parts when the water flows