Monday Trail Ride In The Snowies.

[Crazy Uncle Larry]

Hey guys!

Just wanted to let you know that Number Two/Aaron and I are still hanging on out here. We met up last weekend (25-27 July 09) in Laramie. Went down to see him (his birthday is coming up and his Momma wanted to go see him and the grandsons and the daughter-in-law!) and took the old '81 XT500 down with me. She needs some work and he is going to give me a hand (I'll write more about it in the Yamaha section).

Anyhow, the two of us took Monday and drove out to the Albany area, south of Centennial, WY. He brought his '83 TT600 and I rented a TTR230 from the fine folks at the Albany Lodge. All in all, it cost me $81.86 to use their machine for 4 hours of riding. Not bad considering the scenery we saw and the trail we rode! I hadn't ridden anything as small as a TTR230 since I learned to ride on my cousin's DT175 back in 1970-71! I thought I kind of looked like the dancing bear riding the Shriner mini-bike!!! Like I said, we put 4 hours on the clock and rode around the Albany-Lake Owen-Douglas Creek (I think!)-and Rob Roy reservoir areas, up around the 8000-9500 ft levels. We'll be posting photos and a complete trip report in the days to come.

[loingrader]

I hadn't ridden anything as small as a TTR230 since I learned to ride on my cousin's DT175 back in 1970-71! I thought I kind of looked like the dancing bear riding the Shriner mini-bike!!!

those ttr's do feel pretty small, but they are awfully fun!

[Number Two]

Rental bikes are awesome! 



I'll try to get started on the rest of the report here shortly.

[Number Two]

Alright, here goes...

So my Dad and I had a morning free while he was out visiting, so we headed up to the Snowy Range for some good riding.  His XT is currently under the knife, so we snatched a TT-R230 from the Albany lodge.  We made a loop to the South then West and back.  The riding was all together more difficult than stuff we have done together so far, but nobody dumped it and a good time was had by all.

Me taking the little bike for a test ride around the parking lot.

[Number Two]

I ran the TTR up that embankment in the first picture.  When we landed at the top, the chain had jumped the rear sprocket.  I've had this happen to me all the time on my mountain bike, but never on a motorcycle.  I uncompressed the suspension and slipped it back on.  We never had any problems with it for the rest of the ride, but I guess that's how you tell when your chain needs adjusted.  Compared to the mighTTy 600, the rental bike felt like a toy.  I can see how a light, off-road only trail bike can be very forgiving in the rough, but dual-sport is still the kind of riding I want to do. 

Here's Crazy Uncle Larry in his brand spanking First Gear jacket.  We'll see if we can't get some dirt on it and break it in right. 

[Number Two]

The bikes:



Obligatory 'before' shot:

[Number Two]

A few miles down the road, I decided that we needed to get the blood pumping, and ran up this moderate hill climb.  Neither of us is into coffee, so it seemed like the best way to start the day.

Kind of hard to see the grade in the picture, but this was really steep.  You can get a feeling for it by looking at the far hillside that makes up the valley we just rode out of.  This is certainlly a theme throughout the ride however; I could never get pics of the really great stuff because I was just busy at the time.  There's probably a solution here in the form of a handlebar mount or helmet cam or something, but the point and shoot is going to have to do for now. 



Some ruts.

[Number Two]

That section only lasted for about a mile, and we were both breathing pretty hard.  Looking back.



We dropped into a powerline road which was pretty cool.  It just cut its way to the south.  Lots of hill climbs, good views, and the water bars every 100 yards made for some high-flying entertainment.

[Number Two]

In case you missed him in the last pic.



Centennial Valley.



The Snowies off in the distance.

[Number Two]

From where we got off the powerlines, we jumped on one of the Forest Service dirt highways and worked our way down to Lake Owen, where we hooked up with a trail that loosely follows a non-motorized rails-to-trails project similar to the Mickelson in the Hills.



This trail got a little more interesting as we had a little of this.



Some of that.



And a couple of these.

[Number Two]

There were some interesting water crossings.



And finally some rocks in the trail.



We finally dumped back out onto some more developed roads and took a swing by the old mill at Fox Park.

[Number Two]

After a little more dirt slab, we took a spur that paralleled Douglas Creek.



We took a breather and went down to check out the creek.  After a little sifting, we turned up some placer garnets, an some bright shiny pepper flakes.  The wee pebble on the left was one of the garnets.



The thunder heads are starting to build by this time, and our rental time clock is counting down, so I have a quick look at the map and pick out FS 553 to get us back on our way to Albany.  553 follows muddy creek, and the trail lived up to its name.  It was the most interesting of any of the routes on this ride, and consequently the one I have the fewest pictures of.  Here's the start.

[Number Two]

Every 100 yards to 1/4 mile, we were faced with some variation of stream crossing or mud hole.  If you could get past the slippery snot part, most features had reasonably hard and sandy bottoms.



You get the idea.



As we get into the trees, we encounter some wash-outs.  Some are dry like this one, but others are moist.  Shortly after this pic, we come up on a group with 2 dirt bikes and 2 four wheelers.  They had a KTM 300exc and a cr250r.  The bikes are waiting up for the quads, but when they finally show, they blast into this muddy washed-out pit, and stack it up on its side.  As they are lining up the other quad to winch out, it occurs to me that while we might be a little unstable on two wheels, a motorcycle is incredibly nimble and easy to manuver through rough terrain compared to our 4-wheeled bretheren. 

[Number Two]

The maze of mud holes.



Eagle eyes in the crowd will pick out a moose and a calf back up against the tree line.  I've ran up on a few of these critters while mountain biking out in the Medicine Bow National Forest, and they're huge! 

[Number Two]

We cruised back toward the parking lot with only one little detour through an optional obstacle, turned in the rental, and had a burger at the lodge.  The 600 did pretty well trying to keep up with the TTR, and we got some great riding in.  Next time we'll have to bring the fly poles and a real gold pan and stay to play a few more days.  This was one of my first forays into the Snowies, and I was really impressed. 

We'll be back for more, I'm sure.

Thanks for tuning in.  - Aaron

Maybe Crazy Uncle Larry will jump in with some color commentary to polish things off.