Seitz Lake Trail beta

Why is it that every time I go up Seitz Canyon I end up in a rainstorm? Today's drenching was actually pretty welcome - no lightning and I was beginning to get a bit ripe. In the past, though, I've been caught up there in "Holy SHIT find cover FAST" kinds of lightning storms. Nevada - don't like the weather, wait a minute. ;)

Seitz Canyon holds some good memories for me. Waaaaaaaaaay back when, Seitz Canyon was the scene of my very first backpacking trip - as well as my very first "Holy SHIT find cover FAST" backcountry experience. When I was sixteen years old, the trail up this canyon was in good shape. Now, not so much. It's there, but it's a "Where's Waldo" hide-and-seek-fest.

Flowers are putting on quite a show right now, and there's no need to die of scurvy - currants are everywhere. The serviceberries are just starting to generate fruit, not close to ripe. There'll be a lot of chokecherries this year, too (if Seitz is any indication).

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Figured I'd throw up some beta for those Californians looking for Ruby Mountain trail info.

SEITZ LAKE TRAIL

Length: 10 miles RT from Spring Creek Association 4WD "trailhead"

Elevation gain: 2700'

Difficulty: Class C-R (moderate with route-finding)

Time required: Day hike or overnight

The Seitz Lake trail is a great day hike or overnight for those interested in getting off the beaten path. Literally - the trail is very faint and there's a high probability that you'll spend at least part of the trip routefinding. Be that as it may, Seitz Lake is one of the most beautiful destinations in the Ruby Mountains, and that's saying a lot.

The Seitz Lake trail is a non-wilderness, non-motorized trail, meaning it's open to hikers, horsemen, mountain bikers, skiers, etc. That said, it is not even remotely SUITABLE for mountain bikes, and unless you have legal access you'll have a hard time getting a horse in there. And, once you do - this is no trail for a $30,000 sandbox horse, or for a horse that stands around six months at a time. This is a trail for a steady, strong, self-confident mountain horse. Be advised.

The hike is rated moderate due to the necessary route-finding. The hike itself isn't difficult - there's not much elevation gain in the scheme of things, it's not that long, there's no scrambling or exposure. That said, you will be spending much of this hike off-trail, and will need to be comfortable with cross-country travel. Not only that, but you will need to be comfortable out there on your own - there's no highway up this canyon, cell phones don't bounce, and the cavalry will NOT be coming. I doubt more than a couple of dozen people make this tour every year.

GETTING THERE:
Seitz Canyon can be accessed three ways without getting into mountaineering, none of them particularly easy. You can travel overland legally from Lamoille Canyon, starting your hike by the pulloff for the Powerhouse Picnic Grounds. That makes for a long day. You can ask for access from Ruby Dome Ranch - you're not likely to get it, but you definitely won't get it if you don't ask. Don't trespass, these guys will not put up with it.

The easiest way to access Seitz Canyon is through the Spring Creek Association campground. If you're not an SCA homeowner, you'll be trespassing, but I've never heard of SCA having problems with it. Be a good guest, stay low profile and it's likely that they never will. That's how this trip will be described.

To reach the SCA campground - from Elko travel SE on Lamoille Highway (5th Street) approximately 17 miles to Pleasant Valley Road, a dirt road that takes off straight as an arrow towards the Rubies. The road will make a 90-degree turn - at this corner you'll see a locked green gate to the left. If you have a key to the gate and a high-clearance 4WD vehicle, you can save yourself some walking by driving in. Otherwise, park here and climb over the gate.

From the gate, walk or drive up the section fenceline (it'll be on your left). The road will very quickly turn into a rutted 4WD road. If you're adventurous you can take this road almost all the way to the ridgeline and save yourself a bunch of hiking. You are here to hike though, right? The road will bear right away from the fence and you'll come to a convenient wide parking spot. Leave your vehicle here if you've driven in.

You'll start the trip cross country. Find a nice contouring cow trail and head north east towards the section fence. There are plenty from which to choose and there's no reason to turn this into a brush bash. Make your way uphill to the ridgeline... you'll likely want to follow the contour trails and make switchbacks for yourself. When you get close to the ridgeline, be near the section fence, where you can pick up another nicely contouring cow trail heading into the canyon.
An altimeter or GPS comes in handy here. You'll need to cross Seitz Creek at right around 7000', otherwise you'll be tangling with a hell of overgrown chokecherries. Stay climbers right of the creek and contour your way along the hillside - it's a pretty walk and, again, there are plenty of cow trails and game trails to keep the brush-bash to a minimum. When you get to about 7000', look for a portion of the creek bank that's been cut away by the water. There are some deer trails through the trees about here, and the creek's comparatively shallow at that point. Once you cross, walk straight ahead and you'll be able to get onto an old jeep road that goes another 1/2 mile or so up Seitz Canyon.

As you walk up the road, keep an eye out for the "trailhead" - a rock cairn by a mahogany tree. If you get to the end of the road, at a hunting camp, you've gone too far. Backtrack about 150'.

Once you get on the trail, it becomes very lush, very overgrown, very beautiful. The route largely sticks with the route shown on the USGS topo... if you get that route into your GPS you'll likely stay pretty close. If you don't have a GPS or can't be bothered with trying to find this ephemeral trail, don't worry. Stay climbers left of the creek, stay out of the beaver ponds. The trail will skirt climbers left of those ponds.

There'll be two big benches you'll want to climb... it's best done by getting above the rimrock shelves on your left. There are a fair number of rock cairns, as well as other routefinding friends - sawn deadfall and branches, a few blazes, bent/broken grass. There aren't a lot of tree carvings, but there are a few.

Once you top out on the second bench (past a couple of truly lovely waterfalls), you cross a large field of slickrock as you make your way to the lake. Take some time and savor this - it's beautiful and it gets more so with every step you take.

After about five miles, you'll be at Seitz Lake.

Keep your eye out for critters, I've seen river otters up here (very cool). There are also a lot of ducks and plenty of the other usual suspects for the Rubies.

Heading down, you'll find that it's a whole lot easier to stick with the trail. Don't miss the creek crossing, it comes up faster than you expect. There's a big glacier-remnant erratic boulder with a rock cairn on it, that's your clue to leave the jeep trail for the creek.

Map:

Ruby Dome access update

For those of us (ahem) who have keys to the locked gate at the Spring Creek campground - and thus access to the trailhead for Ruby Dome and other destinations in that part of the range - the Spring Creek Association is going to be changing out the lock (boo!) Anyway, a new key will be $5 if you turn in your old key in exchange.

If you don't have a key to the gate you can still crawl over/through and walk up the road to the campground to get to the trailhead. I don't know if it's legal or not but I've never heard of anyone being busted for trespassing. Based on the number of names in the Ruby Dome register that obviously don't belong to Spring Creek property owners, it's pretty apparent that more than one person has gone over that gate.

IMHO it's utterly ignorant that Spring Creek Association locks people out of that trailhead. I can understand Spring Creek wanting to keep the campground and rifle range for its residents - it's their investment, after all. But put in a man-gate already so that people can at least walk in or ride in on the road and access the forest. Sheesh.

Lamoille Canyon Road update

Well, since Google Analytics tells me that there are still a lot of folks coming to this blog for information on Ruby Mountain trails, I guess I should pass along updates as I have them on topics other than the Secret-Lamoille Trail.

I had a chance to ride my bike up the Lamoille Canyon Road today - a friend of mine likens my riding a 35-lb mountain bike on that road to pushing a barn door uphill for eleven miles, but I digress - anyway, the road is still open to the top and all trailheads accessed via the road are still reachable by car. The snow melted out significantly during my trip to Iowa, and the trails are open and in good shape.

So far they've replaced a lot of the culverts that went under the road, have installed some new ones, and have done some drainage improvements. They're also in the process of replacing the guard rails. The road is still driveable... on a bike, it's a little sketchy on the downhill... lots of gravel and a few places where the pavement has been cut out all the way across for culvert installation. They've also done some work cleaning out the shoulders, so the previous 2" or so dropoffs are bigger. I'm not sure I'd take a road bike up there... will stick with my cross bike when it's running again. YMMV.

They're using a pilot car system, so if you're in a car plan on some delays during work hours. They've been letting me through on my bike, which is nice.

One of the crew guys told me that they planned on starting chip sealing the road in another week or two, starting from the turnaround and heading downhill, and that they are planning on digging up and repaving the road from Lamoille Highway through the Narrows. Completion date as of now is scheduled to be November. They are not planning on widening the road, which is good news IMHO.

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I was interested to see that they've replaced the no hiking sign (hiker with a red circle and slash) at the S-L trailhead with a couple of signs that say "Trail under construction - please do not use. Unsafe." That's funny as hell considering that half of the system trails in this forest are nothing more than blazes and rock cairns. It's more dangerous riding my bike down that piece-o-crap pothole-riddled road. Give them credit for trying, at any rate.

So long, and thanks for all the fish

Well, I've been pretty quiet for the last month and a half, and I owe you all an explanation.

The long and the short of it is - I've resigned from the project.

I could go into a lot of angry details about why I've left, but the bottom line is that I fundamentally disagree with the way the project is being managed and consider it to be a betrayal of what we were trying to do in the first place - to get a trail on the ground, yes... but do it in a way that reflected the values and interests of this community. This was a project driven by the community and for the community. It isn't that, any more... hell, they've even posted a "no hiking" sign at the trailhead. What a waste.

That all said, if they get this first segment of trail on the ground, and there's no reason to think that they won't, we'll have good trail to Talbot Creek. The Talbot Canyon trail needs a whole lot of work to be sustainable, but it's there and people will once again be able to use it to reach Verdi Lake. Not only that, but the existing Conrad Creek and Thorpe Creek trails will be accessible, as will the existing Secret-Lamoille Trail. None of them is in good shape, but they're there and you'll be able to use them.

There's a whole lot of work yet to be done, if somebody else wants to take the lead and see this thing through. The NEPA work for the rest of the project remains to be done, as does the trail design and fundraising. Those are the things that I've been able to coordinate along with my previous partners, primarily Bill Wolf. All of those things have to be completed before the project can go an inch past Talbot Creek (or for that matter, do the badly needed repairs on the Talbot Canyon trail.) Bill's already raised most of the money to get the trail to Conrad Creek, and to do the repairs on the Talbot Canyon trail, if they manage the project right. Without the NEPA, though, the project can't proceed. Maybe the Forest Service can get it done, or one of the other folks running the show these days. Who's to say, but without the team we had in place I don't envision anything happening quickly.

Dreams die, and life goes on. One of my friends has approached me about working on a mountain bike trail system in the hills around Elko, and that sounds like a worthwhile endeavor to me. There's tremendous potential there, if we can get the checkerboard problem worked out. Based on how the community made this project happen, there's no doubt in my mind that we can. I'll just be a lot more careful, next time, about who we bring in to help.

Breaking ground and blazing trails

I have to say that this entire project has done more to impress me with the citizens of Elko County than I could ever have imagined. Yesterday, we celebrated our first National Trails Day with this project - and even on graduation weekend for Elko and Spring Creek high schools... even with it being about the first decent day we've had all spring... even with all of that, we had more than 40 folks show up to roll up their sleeves and get this trail underway.

Best of all, they had a great time and are going to bring their friends when we do this again. Awesome!

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We had the official groundbreaking for the project on Friday, and had a nice crowd on hand for the speechifying. We've had some amazing support for this project (check the list of partners over to the right) and it was really great to hear their take on why all of this work has been worthwhile. Gerry Miller from the Northeastern Nevada Stewardship Group emceed, with comments from Lou Schack from Barrick, commissioners Sheri Eklund-Brown and Warren Russell, and USFS District Ranger Gar Abbas. After the brief ceremonies, everybody grabbed a shovel and headed to the trail to turn some dirt... the cool part is that most folks stuck around for a while to take a short hike up the route. How fun is that?



Then, yesterday, folks started showing up to roll up their sleeves... what an amazing community celebration! We got about 3 switchbacks worth of trail on the ground, on top of the work the Americorps kids did last week. Boy, will they be surprised at all the new trail that happened while they were gone! They'll be showing up again tomorrow evening... I can't wait to see their faces. ;)

We had all kinds of folks there... kids as young as 9 and as old as 86... fisher folks, horsemen, mountain bikers, hikers. David Ashby, the former USFS recreation planner for this area and one of the key people to get this project off the ground, came down from Burley, Idaho with his family in tow... so cool to see them and to celebrate his part in the project. We had a dozen kids from NYTC, who did a great job and had a blast doing it. A real cross-section of our community.

Best of all, people had a chance to "pay it forward"... we've all been enjoying the trails other folks built all those years ago, now it's our turn to build a trail for people who'll enjoy it 50 years from now.

Horsemen and hikers and bikes, oh my!

I had a conversation last night with an anonymous commenter in response to my "What A Community" post that I think is worth sharing with everybody.  The poster was concerned about the multi-use concept of this trail - she hadn't spent a lot of time sharing trails with mountain bikes and was concerned about how those interactions would go. Since there isn't currently any actual mountain bike trail around here, she's probably not alone.  

There are a lot of things that trail builders can do to help prevent user conflicts between horses and mountain bikes, and since this is a new trail we're incorporating a lot of lessons learned elsewhere. One of the real keys is in trail design... you can design a trail to keep MTB speeds in check, and to make sure everybody sees everybody else in plenty of time to act accordingly. Those two things alone will resolve about 95% of user conflicts.

Some of it, too, is in education, and that's also part of what I'd like to see accomplished here. It is my dearest wish to get mountain bikers and horsemen working side by side building and maintaining the trail, so that each can learn from the other about how they use the trail - and each can learn that the other folks aren't bad people, just people enjoying the trail differently. Nobody wants to cause wrecks, either for horsemen or bikes.

As far as protocols go... everybody yields to horses, bikers yield to everybody. That isn't always practiced... a lot of times it's easier for a hiker to step off the trail than for a biker, and they often do. But that's the protocol and most people follow it, especially if you remind them with signage.

The standard protocol for a mountain biker approaching a horseman is for the biker to stop a ways from the horse and talk to the rider, finding out what the rider needs to have happen to pass safely. The biker usually steps off the trail with his bike, preferably to the downhill side, while the horseman rides past. That lets the horse see and smell the human under all of that sweat, and keeps the bike downhill where it won't "pounce" on the horse.

Every trail user needs to be responsible for his own actions. Mountain bikers need to understand that horses are prey animals and react accordingly. If a horse doesn't know what that scary-looking thing is, it is going to react like any other animal that thinks it's about to be eaten. In all likelihood, too, the horse's rider is now scared to death and the situation can spiral out of control. By increasing education and understanding among mountain bikers, and by designing a trail to keep speeds slow and sightlines good, those kinds of wrecks can be avoided.

Horsemen have responsibilities, too. Their primary responsibility is to be certain that their horse is ready to be ridden on a multi-use trail. A lot of times a horseman lets his animal stand around for a month at a time, gets on for an hour or two, and wonders why his horse doesn't trust him and/or misbehaves. A horse on a multi-use trail needs to be thoroughly desensitized, and he needs to trust the leadership ability of his rider. Even if you're in the wilderness where there are no bikes, there are plenty of things for a horse to spook at and cause wrecks. In the last couple of weeks, for example, I've flushed about a dozen grouse up there. They spooked me, never mind a touchy horse. There will be deer up there, cows breaking out of the brush, mules and llamas (a lot of horses don't like either), hikers with big backpacks, loose cinches and turning saddles - all kinds of things that will give a spooky horse fits. A rider that accepts his/her responsibilities as a trail user will ensure that his partnership with his horse is strong enough to be on a trail of this nature.

For what it's worth, I own five horses.  There's only one of them right now I'd take on this trail.  With some work on my part, three of the others would likely be fine.  But I'd never try it without spending some time desensitizing.

What a community!

Just got back from Elko and a day full of meetings with folks from the USFS and the Northeastern Nevada Stewardship Group... had a call from Craig Smith, one of the Friends of the Secret-Lamoille Trail who had made some signs to help volunteers find us on our work days.

Craig is the Wells HS shop teacher, and unfortunately for all of us here has decided to leave our lovely climes and take a job near Teton National Park, in Wyoming.  Tough duty.

Before he left, though, he wanted to do his bit for the trail.  I should have known better than to expect anything less than something amazing.  These signs are beautiful and will serve us well for years to come.  Look for them this Saturday as we work on the trail on National Trails Day.

Thanks, Craig, we'll miss you and look forward to having you back for a hike or MTB ride sometime very soon!

While one great volunteer is moving on, a few more are coming to join us. 

Jerry and Shar Williams from the Reno Chapter of Backcountry Horsemen spent their Memorial Day weekend here in Lamoille touring the project.  They're very excited about the opportunities the project presents, and are staunch supporters of the multi-user trail concept. Our kind of people!  They plan on working with us on the trail themselves, and hope to make this a regular project for their Reno BCH chapter - great news!

One of the more interesting aspects of having Jerry involved is that he is an experienced horse packer, and teaches horse packing techniques for BCH.  His insights into what works best for pack strings will be invaluable to us as we move ahead with the project. The fact that horses and bikes will share the trail will make his contributions critical to the trail's success - by pointing out potential problem areas he'll help us keep this trail enjoyable for everyone. 

Welcome to the team, Jerry and Shar!