Sierra National Forest

Trip report from the weekend of Aug 21-23, 1998.

This is our campsite on the second night at Red Lake.

Roger, Tom, and Guy met me at work at lunch time on Friday, and we took off early to get up to the Sierra National Forest east of Fresno that afternoon. Tom brought his wife and young son, while the rest of us went alone. It took us about five hours to get from Los Gatos up to our first campsite on a dirt road off Rock Creek Road, east of Shaver Lake.

This is the spot where we spent Friday night. We just pulled off the pavement on a side road on the way to the Bald Mountain trailhead, and cruised until we found a spot we all liked.

Saturday morning we packed up and headed up the paved road to the Bald Mountain trailhead. This road makes a loop around Bald Mountain, passng an abandoned fire lookout station on the top. We took the fork to the right, which proved to be the hard way. We had met up with Brendan, and a group of the Mountan Toppers club who had adopted this trail. They were doing some trash cleanup and checking the trail in preparation for an upcoming group run. We were following them as they verified the route, and had some fun while they were at it. We started up a steep loose dirt hill where my thermostat started acting up and my truck heated up. We all made it up and proceeded over a few more obstacles.

Roger made it look easy with his dual Marlin transfer cases and locked front and rear differentials. This trail is rated as Easiest, and for the most part it is, but it does have its interesting sections.

Brendan's '83 has a locked front axle, and did quite well. My poor old truck took the "easy" way on these obstacles, and needed its thermostat pulled prior to trying carburetor hill, on which I suffered the indignity of Roger's winch cable.

Tom came through fine, with his wife alongside, and his young son asleep in the back seat.

After lunch, we continued up to the top of Bald Mountain, and stopped at the old fire lookout tower.

This is the view - and this is the trail

While we were enjoying the view, a full size Chevy Z71 came up with his drop-hitch trailer ball hanging down almost to the ground. He had come up the left fork, which must off considerably more clearance to have allowed him to get up with that thing hanging down. We headed back the way we had come, and took the back way out, over to the Tamarack Winter Sports parking area. There we said good bye to Brendan and his friends. We headed on up Hiway 168 to the dirt road and access to the Coyote Route and Red Lake, our target for the night.

The Coyote Route starts with a steep rutted downhill through the trees. This was Guy's first trip in his '85 4Runner and I hope the trail's difficulty did not scare him away. It took us two hours to rock, sock, and spot our way the two miles up to the lake. This trail is rated as More Difficult, and it was. Basketball and larger sized rocks covered the trail in many steep sections, which made for some bouncy driving. But we all made it up with little apparent damage. I lost my motor mounts somewhere along the way, but I didn't have any problems other than weird vibrations, and shift levers bent way over.

We picked a nice campsite along the side of the lake, and except for a few annoying mosquitoes, had a very pleasant evening. The picture at the top of the page was made from across the lake, in the morning. This one was also taken in the morning, from the head of the lake, looking back toward our campsite.

About 11:00 we headed back down the trail, and as usual, found it much easier going down the tough parts. It only took us an hour to get back to Sand Flats, and the trailhead. Along the way, I got out and took a picture of my truck sitting on some rocks.

We stopped at one spot that had given us trouble on the way in, and let a group of jeeps pass us going in, and a ranger in a Wrangler pass us on the way out. You can see the trail winding through the trees behind us.

Back in Sand Flats, we split up. Tom and Guy headed for home, while Roger and I went back in to West Lake for lunch. This was the first place I had taken my truck off-road a couple years ago, and it was fun to go back. The lake is the same, the outhouse in the campsite is a little nicer. This trail is rated Easiest, and it is a very nice drive. It only took us about 20 minutes to cover the half mile into the lake.

On the way home, Roger and I figured out the route from Hiway 99 that Brendan had recommended. We got off course for a while, but finally figured it out. More details on the route to this area of the Sierra NF, and a scan of the local map are on the page you can access by clicking the small map here.

Click here to read the directions to Shaver Lake, and view the NFS map of the area.

Click here to go back to the Place Info Page

Click here to go back to Barney's 4x4 Home Page

This page last updated 9-1-98.