Hunter and I explore a homestead and ancient petroglyphs along the Snake River across Swan Falls Dam. Heavy clouds darken the sky as we’re close to completing our arid loop. (Before you get excited, note this route is currently closed to motor vehicles.)
Michael and I make a loop between Idaho City, Rocky Bar and Atlanta, Idaho, down forest roads, through a bit of snow, and finally ridge-top single track. It was a good thing he brought a saw or we might have missed “whoopty hell.”
I am led by some guy I haven’t met before, Michael, down hours of mountain single track around Deadwood Reservoir. We start up to Bogus, through Placerville and Crouch before hitting narrow mountain trails I’d never ridden before — adventure as usual.
Plans for an easygoing day go the way such plans usually do. We take an unexpected run at Windy Ridge and make an unexpected visit to one of our 2010 campsites. “Unexpected” is the word of the day. We conclude the day laughing around a fire under tall cedars. All’s well that ends well.
We are ready to ride, year six. We point our three motorcycles east from Pierce to Weitas Creek across forest roads and trails. What should be a short day of riding turns into something else.
I haul two motorcycles — one for me, one for Jeremy — to Pierce, Idaho, starting point for the year’s Abbott Brother ride. I am there an evening in advance to secure our spot so I use the extra time to visit historic sites around the town.
I camp two nights for a local club ride meant to climb the challenging trail to historic Boulder Basin near Sun Valley. There is camaraderie and beauty in the midst of defeat.
Brenna and I drive to the recently opened Trinity Recreation Area to camp along Big Trinity Lake and feed the mosquitoes. She swims, makes me a flower salad and map while I prepare the hotdogs and marshmallows. After a restless night we leave to the sunrise reflecting fire off placid waters.
I go alone to follow narrow trails along unexplored Lava and perhaps Rattlesnake Mountains. I hope to reach North Star and Smith Creek Lakes seen on the map. The scenery is the best I know this close to home even as aches and pains remind me of my age.
Little Brenna and I take the doors off the Jeep for a drive to Idaho’s historic Silver City and the surrounding alpine mountains. On the way we stop at the Owyhee Museum in Murphy then begins our search for the gold we finally discover in the setting sun with only a minor loss of skin.
Hunter and I trailer to the Eighth Street trailhead then ride the rest of the way to the ridge and Eagleson for his first overnight trip off the motorcycle. We see a skink, sit around a fire, sleep and ride home through some difficult mental terrain.
My brother Joel and I explore the ATV and single track trails around Skyline Drive in McCroskey State Park before setting up camp in view of Moscow Mountain.
“You alright?” I asked the young guy as he stood, straightened his shirt and brushed off the dust.
“Yeah, fine,” he answered in a subdued tone.
“You guys are haulin’!” I observed.
“Yeah,” was all he said in the same tone.
The hills facing Boise are criss-crossed with trails, most of them for hiking and biking but a few are marked for motorcycles as well. Hunter has been saying he’d like to ride and camp but when the day arrived he wasn’t feeling like it so I decided to make a quick run up around the ridge by myself.
Hemingway Butte just south of the Snake River is an area I haven’t ridden since before Hunter was born. It’s dry and dusty trails create an experience more visceral, more prosaic than aesthetic. “The trailheads offer restrooms and loading ramps, and they provide access to hundreds of miles of roads, moderate to difficult trails and sand washes on steep, rocky terrain.”
I ride over the hills to the Danskin area for my first overnight trip of the year and first time camping from the KTM. Luggage woes and difficult trails keep me from getting as far as planned but morning along Willow Creek makes it all worth it.
I was also twelve the first time I rode a motorcycle (my cousin Jeff’s). Hunter practiced a little around the house — as much as we imagined the neighbors would tolerate — and briefly in the open dirt south of the Idaho State Correctional Institution, but this was his first point-A-to-point-B ride.
After a couple months parked in pieces in the garage, I finally get the new KTM out for a first dirt ride on the Danskin trails under patches of blue and between sheets of rain. The whoops are more pleasant than on the GS and the singletrack more inviting.
What she actually said was, “when you put this on the computer, call it, ‘Tell mommy this is a mermaid.’” She knows how this works.
I was working at home so agreed to her oft repeated request to go to the river.