Headed out Saturday to explore some roads and trailheads I've never been on and planned to do a short solo day hike up thunder creek a ways. I'm going on the BCRT trip here in a few weeks and wanted to check it out. It was after 1 o'clock by the time I started up the trail and I didnt plan to go all the way up to the junction with Shedroof as I wasn't sure I wanted to do 10 miles. Well as it turns out I went up to the junction and then decided I didnt want to go back through the old roadbed/clearcut section of thunder creek again. The wilderness/old growth section is truly amazing but wanted to explore new trails. I haven't been on the shedroof divide before and wanted to see the views. They did not disappoint! I also knew a loop could be done by using Shedroof cutoff that would get me back pretty close to the car. Got out the map and figured I had enough daylight to do the loop so I headed north up the divide. There's always that extra motivation when on a new trail!
The Shedroof divide between thunder creek and the shedroof cutoff does have some trees down but the real nuisance is the brush. Guess I should have worn long pants! There are long stretches (many of them through the burned area) where you can hardly see the trail. Thunder creek trail is in great shape. I anticipate most if not all the work will be done on shedroof divide trail.
There were a few spots to get water up on the divide but they were small and not sure how long they'll be available. There is one decent spot near where Jackson creek trail begins. Mosquitos weren't bad but the black flies were relentless! Had to keep moving to keep them off me. Didnt see a single person or animal all day.
Had a great day even though my planned short day hike turned into about 14 miles. Took just over 7 hours. Got to explore new trails and made it back to the car before dark so all was good!
Comments