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Thread: Tony Grove to White Pine Lake to Bunchgrass Trail

  1. #1

    Tony Grove to White Pine Lake to Bunchgrass Trail

    I tried a little bikepacking as the rest of the party were on foot. I'll have to make some adjustments for next time.

    While the other guys hiked back down the way they came, I decided to try out the Bunchgrass trail to the highway. It was pretty tough with a huge pack on, it was a steep rocky trail with a LOT of fallen trees over the trail. The pack kept pushing me forward on the bike as I'm sloping downhill and braking for rocks and trees. Let's just say I spent a lot of time lifting my bike up.

    The more mild parts of the trail were decent, but it had a lot of hoof traffic so it was pretty dusty and sandy.

    Anyways, the fishing was decent up there, and it had some great scenery as this was my first trip up there.

    The parking fee at Tony Grove Lake is $5 per night, and the trail to White Pine is 4 miles.

    Thanks for all of the advice.



    I'm stealing nielether's map showing where I roughly went on the bike....and I may have made a wrong turn or two.

    Viewing on a mobile device? Click this link to open the map: http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&t=h&msid=107942267772270744381.00048e05dcc23917e3774&ll=41.913136,-111.614399&spn=0.066937,0.132351&z=13

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  3. #2
    So here's where I made my mistake descending Bunchgrass trail today. I come to this sign that has 2 choices of left or right. I've just come from White Pine Lake which was Left on the sign, and Right was the Bunchgrass Trailhead taking me to Hwy 89.

    The problem was there are 2 trails to the right of the sign, 3 if you include a less traveled trail.

    The logs crossing the trail immediately to the right of the sign didn't mean anything, because I've crossed about 20 fallen trees just to get to this point due to poor maintenance.

    I walked @ 1/4 mile up the FAR RIGHT trail, it ascended and went away from Hwy 89, so I came back. I assumed the sign must mean the trail to the immediate right. So this is the one I took, and soon realized the mistake.

    For @ 1 mile it seemed like the right trail, worn the same with all of the right signs, heading towards Hwy 89. Then suddenly the trail fizzled out and I ran into about 10 cattle. The trail was steep and I had my heavy backpack on, there was no way I was going to make it back up to the sign. My only choice now was to forge East towards the highway finding an occasional weak cattle trail. I would say I biked cross country for about a mile through the sage brush and basketball sized boulders, with a 40 lb pack, alone, and on a (non) trail that I didn't know.

    I was getting a little desperate because my friend Preston said he'd give me until noon to reach the road, and then he'd hike up to look for me. This was troubling because there were about 3 different trails he could come up, and I was on neither of them. So I was lost, exhausted, and in a hurry.

    Needless to say I just kept pressing East trying to disturb as few cow pies as possible and I finally made it to the highway just in time to see Preston driving my truck to come after me.

    Anyways, here is a video showing my audible thoughts as I try to decide which way to go from the sign.


  4. #3
    Hey Justin, I'm sorry it wasn't all we chalked it up to be! Too bad I haven't ridden it this year to have warned you about the logs. Yeah, cow get to the lower part, but I forgot to mention that. Honestly I do not remember this sign! I'm glad you got your ride in time.

    Is Preston married to a girl named Jeremi?

  5. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by Sombeech View Post
    ....The problem was there are 2 trails to the right of the sign, 3 if you include a less traveled trail....
    D'OH! I made that same mistake the first time I rode that trail. Did you end up having to do a sketchy river crossing to get over to the highway? I apologize, I usually mention the two nasty hike-a-bike sections that ended up turning you around. Is now the appropriate time to mention that my favorite part of the ride is after the two hiking sections....?

  6. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by Shan View Post
    Is Preston married to a girl named Jeremi?
    no, sorry

    Quote Originally Posted by neilether View Post
    Did you end up having to do a sketchy river crossing to get over to the highway?
    No, I actually had to trespass on this dude's property to cross his bridge.

    I don't think it would have been so bad, but biking with that pack was a nightmare. I couldn't keep my head tilted up because it'd hit the top of the pack. And when I'd need to step off or over a log (seemed like once every 200 yds) I couldn't just straddle the bike because the bottom of my pack would be sitting on the seat.

    The whole time I was just way too much forward, I'm surprised I didn't endo a lot.

    My mistake is I forgot to print the google map of the trail. I can see now where the trail goes back up a tad and away from the highway maybe 1/5 of a mile, and that just didn't look like the right way to me so I came back to the other route.

    The fork is at that first general 180 turn back to the west, and I came straight east off of the trail down to the highway. I might post up the coords in a bit.

    Definitely a beautiful area, but a little too many rocks, sand and fallen trees for me. Most of the trees were 2-3 feet off of the ground, so I would literally have to pick the bike up to cross. That got to be too much with my heavy pack. Definitely a different ride with a smaller pack though, I might consider it again.

  7. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by Sombeech View Post
    .....Definitely a beautiful area, but a little too many rocks, sand and fallen trees for me. Most of the trees were 2-3 feet off of the ground, so I would literally have to pick the bike up to cross. That got to be too much with my heavy pack. Definitely a different ride with a smaller pack though, I might consider it again.....
    Hmmm, I'm curious if you can give me some more details. I know exactly where you went off the trail, but were all the fallen trees in the trail before that wrong turn, or after? Are you lumping the climb out of Tony Grove in with this trail report as well, or just focusing on the descent from White Pine down Bunchgrass? The climb has quite a few areas of embedded rocks that can be tricky, and the descent from the crest down to White Pine is a rocky riot, without a backpack anyway.....The initial descent from White Pine Lake, to the first stream crossing is always rocky and loose and you just kind of have to surf down it. Other than that this trail is usually fairly smooth (albeit quite dusty this time of year). Granted, I haven't been up there since early summer, but it was in pretty good shape then.....

  8. #7
    I edited the Google Map to show where the wrong turn was made (can very easily be done....) and the bushwhacking route down to the highway. According to the edited map, Beech managed to travel a very straight line while somehow avoiding cows, their excrement, and barbed wire fences.....

  9. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by neilether View Post
    I edited the Google Map to show where the wrong turn was made
    That's exactly it, with a few squiggles missing.

    I've still got to throw the video up here, there are some decent shots. Some of it is only hopping over trees with audio of "are you kidding?"

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