Fisher Creek Trail

Day 4

18 miles

2200 ft Elevation

This was an incredible ride. The best of the week so far. Again I left early to beat the heat. Beau and Craig Beaver joined me. Its great to convince others out of bed early so I didn't have to ride alone. I think everyone thought I was crazy to get up at 6am everyday while on vacation.

So it was cool when we set out on our 9 mile climb. A side hill out of the flat valley and into the Williams creek valley started our day. We climbed through the deep Lodge Pole and Ponderosa pine forest. The climb was gentle. Not the lung busting anaerobic climbs of Adam's and Mahoney Gulch. This was a great trail to get a rhythm going and climb all day. We climbed up to a high point and then had a great break going down hill on an open slope into a meadow. The trail crossed a stream and then headed side hill up the valley again. After climbing again we entered the remains of the forest after last year's forest fire. It was like a blast zone. Blackened tree trunks poked out of the ground, bare with no branches left. The ground was ashe grey. Rock outcrops that had been hidden by forest were no exposed on the hillsides of the route. Bright green grass blazed along a small creek in contrast with black and grey all around these small oasis's.

We got another break of down hill along the valley and came to another meadow full of wildflowers and only touched by wildfire at its edges. From there we climbed to the intersection of the Fisher creek and Warm Spring Trails (see trail journal for Day 5). We turned right and did the last big climb of the ride. 2 miles of swithbacks and sidehill up hillside that was just as parched as the lower burned area. It was still cool. Good thing because there wasn't any shade.

We came to the top of the trail where the Fisher creek road climb met the trail. Beau, Craig, and I took a break at the top. A cool breeze was blowing on the hilltop. No misquitoes and it was cool. I think we hung out on the top for about 45 minutes just relaxing, eating, and drinking our water. The rest of the group started arriving and soon all but a few were up at the top.

We finally started heading back down on a fast ribbon of trail. The pay off for all that hard work. We ran into Erik on the way up. Then headed back down to the intersection in much less time then it took us to climb the distance. Then more down hill. The the first climb. I thought I'd dread the two climbs we had to do on the way back down but we were warmed up by this time and the were painless.

I think it took us 45 minutes to get back to the trailhead. We were all happy. Today was the breakthrough day when our lungs were adjusting to the altitude, the trail was epic, and the heat was less than previous days. Back tomorrow for a real eco-adventure.

P6270001	Craig riding through meadow	Side hill climb
Beau from Colorado	Craig on technical section	P6270009
Meadow green amidst the burn	Last year's forest fire	Bed of green
Stone sculpture	Beau coming in to meadow	Charcoal tree
Craig at intersection in the burn	The upper trailhead	Break time
Beau, Lisa, and Craig at top	John Kiner at top	The rest of the group
View of the burn on descent	P6270032	Now we get to descend!!!!
Back in to the green	Side hill descent	Last short climb out of meadow
Trail winding through meadow	P6270042	Meadow
Bridge over creek	Wild flower	Forest descent