516: Northern California Trails High Points
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Welcome 1. Welcome them all to the snail
trail h bath for my guest. If you
like doing hurting in is on toyota is camping theaters, and maybe even poking a little bit of fun toyota. And of course, nearing in how
fantastic. Some of these great trails in northern
California is Toyota.
And. This is the podcast for you. That's
right Ladies. My name is Tyler. Joining me
another episode in trial 04:04 podcast.
And the studio, what do you say n? And Studio n
is the 1 and only mister Jimmy Jet over here. What up? How's it going? How
you be? Doing pretty good man? Good. We
are on...
Was it That'd be Thursday?
Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday Monday. Day 5 of
wearing the same outfits. Yeah. Right? The wearing
the same tops, because it was still not wearing in pants.
Tyler finally put Tony's on though. I did.
Yeah. I I was getting tired. It was
too distracting. Right. I'm trying to... We're trying
to record stuff and and Jimmy just keeps looking over. I just... I Yeah. I can't
blame me. Yeah. Anyways,
Mu.
Monday.
Yes. Is the official start of July. Oh,
So no more contests. No more contests.
No more Walter tool month. No more Walter
tool month. Oh, no more giveaways.
No more.
I.
Well, yeah. We're still... I was gonna see.
We don't have to announce them for, like, 30 minutes.
Okay. Good. Right Yeah.
Wow.
While 2 month is over. 2 month is
done.
Massive, thanks to Law, Corey, and the Walter team over there for...
Mh. Giving us some fun things to talk
about, letting just play with some of your toys and allowing some of these listeners to win some fantastic, goodies. Yeah. Like, the Mag drill that I
won. So... Oh, we didn't announce that haven't.
My bad. Yeah. Sorry, buddy. Thursday. Thursday Thursday,
we will, probably announce the winner for the Mag drill.
And I think that's it. Oh, and we'll announce
the winner for our week 4. On the
the who won, the drill bits and who tagged a friend and what the friend 1? Cool as well.
Yep. Yep. And then we will also be
able to announce July giveaway. That's right. On
Thursday Leave little confirmation on that yet? Not
yet. Okay. You have talked about it. In
the past. We have talked individual. What's the
individual, he said he was on board. So
I just gotta confirm, make sure he still is on board. If not,
then we have another giveaway that we can do with more flight that I haven't announced it yet.
Is this the thing you've been teasing me about the.
Jimmy, I a secret.
I didn't I didn't talk about secrets past 2 episodes. So I know I was just
thankful. No. I a that's a different secret.
Oh, I still can't tell anybody. The lady
never called me Back. I need to reach
out to her. It's a lady. Yes.
Okay. My contact is a lady. Oh, who's
my contact?
Me.
I wanna know what the secret is that you're holding over my head. It's a pretty cool... It's not
just. I'm holding over everybody's said, okay. Don't
think you're special.
You're talking about about talking and not to me but you're just talking into a mic.
It is. Yeah. To everybody. No. The the
secret really is for everybody. Right. It's super
freaking rat. So, it's about me. It's about
you to everybody, something that, I think a lot of people had a hand in but I can't say anything.
But, no. I have another secret though that
I will be able to talk about very soon. Okay. I was gonna wait and see
if our July giveaway still was confirmed for July?
Okay. And if not, then we will... I
will announce it on next week. Got it.
I think I know what that 1 is.
You were were talking about it a little bit before with Oz. Yep. Mh.
If not, we got something in the back of the warehouse so we might be able to give away as well. Yeah. So 1
1 way another we've got... We got some
pretty awesome stuff. We got 3 months worth
of planning. I just need to know which
1 we're gonna reg rotate out to you guys. Yes.
Alright. We're gonna throw to you guys. But
let's see. We also have,
the reviews going on for a cent of Yokohama tires.
Yep. That giveaway is going on until we
reach 750 reviews. Yep. What did we were were just
over 3 or 06:50.
We're just over 3 82. And way over
3 80.
Many levels. U. But we're also over 650
reviews. Right? We just rolled over that 1.
Yep. With... And we're still looking for 19
Toyota 4 by 4 pickup. Something like that.
It's some combination of those 6 words. I
haven't written out somewhere. Yeah.
But... Yeah. If you're at 19 86,
And it's Toyota by 04:19 86, Toyota pickup. I think that's what it
is. I know. 19 86 I don't think
Had the book when I wrote it down here. But Yes. Get in contact with us.
It'll that's you. I have it in the
show notes. Okay. I wrote it down correctly
in the show notes. No. I don't have
it in here.
Brian, Can you look that up, please? But
if you... If that's you, get in contact
with us because you want a swag pack.
That is Swag pack includes an On x off road elite membership. You and some goodies
from snail trail 4 by 4. And maybe
some stuff for more flight and snail armor as well. Maybe we're also doing that same
exact giveaway for 700 reviews. So get in now because that not
only makes you eligible for the 700 review giveaway. But it still makes you eligible
for the 750 reviews, which is the Yokohama tire giveaway, which is pretty much any tire you want as long as it's Dot approved and smaller than a 20 inch rim. Yep. Brian Texted me? Okay. 19 86
Toyota 4 by 4 pickup. Think that's what
I said. Now, you're way off. I think
that's exactly what I I think, no. You
said 19 86 high luxe 4 by 4 Surf Ra. Yeah. Ra.
U.
Sure.
Mh. Good thing we don't record these or
anything. We're probably to go back checking. I
can go back. Whatever.
All I could... I do the editing. I'll
go back and make sure I say the right thing. Okay. I can just put it
little more voice. Yep. Alright. Cheater. Yes.
Just so Have a win. Yeah. Alright. Anyways,
what are we talking about? No comment tires
You giveaways ways. So pretty cool style have
them. Pretty cool stuff. We got a lot
of giveaways on always, so pay attention to the show. If you guys
like some of the stuff we're giving away and want a chance to win it. We
got lots of ways to do that. Just
make sure you you know how to do it. That's why we talk about it almost
every episode just so that you guys do get the chances to win some pretty cool stuff that we get to work with some pretty cool companies on. So
let's see. Walter.
Yes. Is still doing their Annual or their,
yeah. Annual, I guess, maybe annual there.
Your company wide giveaway. Yeah. If you go
into any of your local hardware or welding supply stores, there should probably be walter, drill bits or triumph, drill bits or drill drill code, drill bits, or Walter consumables, or, you know, what's the the easy e? What's
the welding stuff? What was that called? Do
you remember that I took from you? I
don't know. You stole. So I able to
play forgot what it was called.
But there's all kinds of Walter stuff. So
if you go and you purchase something from Walter, and you take a picture of the Qr code, send them, I think you have to send them your receipt. That makes you eligible
to win a 20 24 f 01:50 tremor. Yep. Walter also doing monthly
giveaways on there as well, so you enter Whenever you enter, you're eligible for that month. Mh.
And then you're... All those entries go into
the, grand price winning of the, f 01:50. Yep.
Now, La and the Northern California regional rep guy from Walter have extended that to Snail trail 4 by 4.
Where we now will say if you take a photo of yourself and any Walter triumph for drill c products and send it into us, then that gives you 1 point or 1... Yep. I guess, point... Will work
for this phrase.
And or if you purchase that gives you an additional 0.3 I entry. Mh. We're gonna
tally up all those entries that you guys send to us and we are gonna have our own separate giveaway item at that. And ours ends in
August, and I think the Walter 1 ends On, November I believe was what they're doing the grand price drying. So if you wanna
win a price another additional price from us, you can get in and win something in August and all those entries if you enter into the Walter 1 as well, you can win an f 01:50 tremor, a 2 year lease.
In your lease. Trimmer.
So that's pretty cool. Yep. Pretty cool stuff.
Lots of giveaways going on. Lots of fun
companies we get to work with. So there's
that That's all I think. That's all it is.
Sweet. Yeah. We'll talk to you guys Got
a lot updates for you on Thursday for winners, wrapping up tool month. As well as announcing
July giveaway.
And, yeah. I think we got some fun stuff
lined up for Thursday. Today is gonna be
very boring.
Because that's Monday? Yes. I'm just kidding. We're
gonna find furious days.
Theory dates guide.
Yeah today's is Monday. So we could talk
about, back to... We're gonna kinda continue on our
trail highlights. Yeah. Series that we've been doing
before Tool month. So kinda, hate when tools
get in the way of stuff. Giving the
away tools get the way of talking about already or all the cool build challenges that are happening out throughout the world. I know.
So we're gonna get back into the the trail series. This the last of the trails
that we can have had on our list we wanted to talk with you guys about are not so they're just shorter trends. Right?
So they're there's not a ton going on, like, the Rub and, like, ford ice.
So we're gonna throw in probably quite a few trail stains. Just give you guys highlights
of if you'd wanna go and check out this trail, what is the draw to that trail? Why would you wanna go check out
this trail while you're Northern California to begin with. And, we'll see how many
charles we get to do? Yeah. So... Yeah.
We got long list of 12345678, possible ones that we're gonna talk about today.
We'll see how many we can get through.
If we don't get through moa, cover them on the next week's episode. Sweet. Sounds good.
So we'll take a quick break here.
Good to hear from some of our friends, and we'll be right on back. Good Grab
your favorite drinks. Grab your favorite popcorn.
And actually has have some flavor popcorn right behind me. Am might able to get into
that? Yeah. Kettle popcorn. I love... I know
how you enjoy people eating on the microphone.
Oh my god. Please don't. And we'll be
we'll be right on back. With today's campfire
fire discussion.
4 wheel underground website just got an upgrade.
Come on by and check out the new functionality, new photos and new pricing.
Finally works on mobile 2. Visit 4 wheel
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Oh wow. Come back ladies and
at ladies, to today's camp discussion.
We're gonna be chatting with everybody today about some fun trails here in Northern California.
And what are the draws to those trails? Right? If you're gonna be
making a trip to Northern California, say you live in Northern California. And you've never been
to this trail before, and you've always thought about Yeah. I should go check that out.
Yeah. Never had a real reason to go
check it out though. Hopefully, we're gonna give
you the reason today. Sounds good. And if
you don't live in Nor, and you're like, Man I need a reason to go to Northern California, then come out to Northern California for pizza source racks.
And then go wheel. Right? And go check
out some of these traps. We'll give you
guys some stuff to do and the draws to each of these trails so that you can kinda be like, Yeah. That I don't...
I'm not interested in and that doesn't sound interesting to me, not my cup of tea, but that sounds like my Cup tea, that trail. What that guy's got to offer. So...
Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. I think that we
have a... On this list that we have
here, we have a wide variety of skills Mh. Or challenged
trails on here. We've got some that are
are ranked up there pretty high, and then we have some that are semi fire road ish. Right? So it's... It'll we have a
wide variety today to talk about. Mh. And
I think to some extent that's 1 or 2 of the draws of them. Yeah. Totally.
Yeah. Absolutely.
So let's just go... You and I have
the same list. We ended up copying it
over. So let's start at the top. Shall
we? Yeah. No particular order or geographical order
or anything. We just sort of were making
a list as we went. Yep. Our first
1 is sort of the Gold Lakes area.
Yeah.
Yeah. It's it's private.
Only driven past I've actually never stayed at Gold Lakes. What? Yeah. I didn't know that.
I thought you had been I thought you'd at least stayed in the 4 by 4 area. No Never. I went to Snake lake.
Okay. I drove We did the sweet pass.
Gold Lakes. Okay. And I've driven past all
the campsite sites. Okay. So I've done the
road in. U. But... No. I've never... I've...
I mean, I've driven driven the trail to Gold Lakes, but I've never stayed at Gold Lakes. Gotcha. Okay. So
where is Gold bikes?
Jeez. I would... Let's see. So it... I
would say it's Well, it's off of highway 49 slash another highway.
I don't know what the name... That other
1 is. 20. I don't... It's like 70.
Maybe 70. That's up quincy. It's up near
Quincy, which is 89.
Okay. But it's not
80... It's not off of 89. No. That's
like Downing.
Yes. Just over by Downey,
you could get there from going up from Auburn on Highway 05:49, or you could drop down from Quincy. Yeah.
To get there. So it's it's way up
in Northern California. It's quite high. And,
there are trails higher than this. Mh. But
I think this is 1 of the highest...
What is out? A lot of changed. I
know. Lot of latter So Yeah attitude. Yeah.
It's 1 of the highest latitude trails that I've done in California. Okay. Yeah. But it's
very high elevation. Mh.
And so the window of opportunity to do this trail is really determined on how much snow there. Yeah. Yep. The snow sticks around
for a long time afterwards.
After snowfall, It is high up there. It is in
in my opinion, I love the entire highway 49 corridor Yeah.
Corridor.
Getting there is... Yeah, absolutely gorgeous. It's 1
of the most stunning drives you will ever do. And that is actually 1 of the
draws to Gold lake for me.
It's just the drive to get to Gold Lake. Yeah. It's pretty cool in and of
itself. But Gold Lake is it... Like, jimmy
said, high elevation. And it's a it's a
beautiful area. And what's really really neat about
Gold Lake is Gold Lake itself is not difficult to get.
It's paved all the way there. Yes. There's
a boat ramp. So you can get on
the lake in a boat. I don't know
if it's... I motorized or what the rule
is for motorized on it, but you can get floating device on Gold Lake. So you don't
need a 4 by 4 to get there at all. You get their tool drive. But
there's a 4 by 4 area 4 by 4 specific campground ground. Mh. Which
is really cool. It is really cool. The
only way you can get there is by having a semi decent 4 by 4. Yeah. There's
1 obstacle.
Yeah. Well, and... The 1 gatekeeper. Yeah. Pretty
much. And that's it. Yeah. And now that
I put rock sliders on the Tacoma, I think the tacoma could make it. Yep.
Fairly decently. Yeah. When I was there
last year or a year before. I remember
what it was at the 4 by 4 campground area. I only had the f 01:50.
Right? And so I didn't take the F
01:50 back into the 4 by 4 area.
We hiked it. To go back to see
our friends that were back there. And then
we hiked out and on the way out, a stock brand new, like, he had just bought it within the past 1 or 2 months.
Came into the 4 by 4 trail. And
I was like, stock what? Tacoma. Oh, sorry.
Tacoma. Brand new, Stock tacoma, came in the
trail. I was like, You sure you wanna
come go go down this. And he was
like, yeah.
I was like, okay. And he we... I
kinda watched him and we got down to that gatekeeper spot. And ripped off part of
his rear bumper coming over those rocks. Yeah.
Yeah. I might do that as well. I
mean, there it's a rocky area sort of sort of an off cam. Mh. If you...
When I did it, there was a high line, high driver's side line, but it linked you up against a rock. So you really
needed rock sliders. Yeah. Bob kat, I took
Bob kat went up there when I did it. Bob probably could have done it in
2 wheel drive. Like, and not hit a
single thing. And them go in either whatever
way you want. You know, like,
choose your choose your own desire. Yeah.
I did it with Brennan from Trail 4 r, and he was in the white 4 runner, the original white 4 runner. Okay. Without
a bumper, with.
No... Yeah. No portals, no bumper. I think
it it had rock sliders, and I think he's came slightly came down not hard on the rock slider on the line we took them, but that was it, Like, it wasn't hard. Yep. So going and
going down that is really the only obstacle, but then there's just sort of a fairly flat, smoothest ish dirt road out to the campsite sites. Yep.
About a mile and a half long. Yeah.
So not difficult to get to. The 4
by 4 air camping area does because it... There's a lot of signs
at the entrance to, the 4 by 4 road there. I don't say prohibits. People deter.
Deter. Thank you. It deter a lot of
people from going down there. Mh. So typically,
it's not super busy.
Kinda depends on time of year in which weekend you go. It can get busy in
there and there is very limited space.
And to top it off this year, they just started doing reservations for the 4 by 4 years. Oh, really? Yeah. Okay. So it's
not first come for serve anymore. You're supposed
to get reservations.
You could show up. And if
they're full, you might be able to still find space at Gold lake, the regular camping, the peasant camping, which in my opinion camping, the paved camping.
Yeah. In my opinion, it... That's a better
camping spot than the 4x by 4 area.
Really? Yes. Because the 4 by 4 camping
spots. You're almost... You literally are parking on
the lake. Pretty much. Yeah. The cool thing
about the the the peasant area of the paved area is that there's no bad campsite. Okay. They
they have every campsite kinda laid out in a row all the way down the lake shore. Sure.
So every campsite is... Has lake front property
pretty much. Okay. It's a really cool spot.
And you just look out over the lake and almost I'd say every 2 to 3 campsite sites there's a little beach that people just have made from traversing there. Yeah.
So if it's it's not super busy, and you have your own little private beach there too, and it's just... It's absolutely gorgeous, There's no
bad campsite sites at Gold Lake. Yeah.
At the peasant 1. At the peasant 1.
The off road 1 doesn't have bad spots either does just camping on both sides of the road, And you're... It's a dirt road.
So if it's hot, and dry, it might get dusty. Yep. And the only camping slash
swimming, the only swimming beach spots that I that I saw. Granted, I didn't stop there.
Were through other people's campaign spots. Yeah. And that's the
downside. Right? If you end getting there late,
You don't get 1 of the waterfront ones.
You're kinda back a little bit, and you have to hike through people's campsite to get to the waterfront, which I always hate doing.
Yeah. And there's no camp post at the
4 by 4 area, which is a good and bad thing, but I found that the 4 by 4 area is a lot also more dense. All the campsite are right on
top of each other. Whereas the campground ground,
the paved area is much more spread. So
you're less likely to have a bad neighbor, or people that refused to turn the music off at 2AM. Yeah. So it's a it's...
You get the benefit of being down the 4 by 4 area, it's a little more shade down that route down there, but you have in my opinion in a better camping experience if you like quieter camping. Sure. In
the the paved area. Oh, it's exhausting. Yeah.
Toilets. There are toilets out at the 4
by 4 camping. Yes. There a pit toilets
there. Yeah. That's... I remember that. There have,
like, dedicated buildings. Yep. So somebody must come
out there and clean them up. So they
get through the gatekeeper or they have another way around. I'm not sure which it is.
But... Yeah. There are toilets pit toilets out
there in nice you know, buildings. Yeah. Nice.
Concrete buildings. Yeah. So that's cool. The the
other that Nice thing about Gold lake is that there's another... There's an actual off road
trail. That's not super difficult.
That's a big loop. Yeah. There's a lot
of off trails out there. Yeah. Yeah. There's
the 1 I think we're gonna talk about a snake lake. Mh. But, you know, once
you get up there, there's all kinds of split offs and turns and directions to go, there's a camp or not a campground. There's
a fire lookout tower out that direction as well that you can get to, which I've never gone to, but I want to. Mh.
I don't think you can drive all the way up to it, but I think you can drive a good chunk of the way out there, and then you have to hike a little bit. You can get to that
from the Gold Lakes area, and you can get to it from Highway 49.
Okay. So you can come you can tack
it from both sides. Okay. But Snake lake
is a fun trial. Have you done the
snake lake? Not done snake. Yeah. Yeah. So
Snake lake a good good little trail. It
has there are a few spots in there that I had to go and look at while driving Bob. Okay. Right? I wouldn't say
they're the absolute. The hardest things to do.
U. But, you know, they did make you
have to pay attention. Okay wasn't 1 that
you could just simply drive. There was
let's say we did the loop counterclockwise to get down to the leg, and there was a few drops and, downhill dissent that were fairly difficult, some, like, sort of off cam leaning towards a wall Scenarios. And then on the way out,
it was sort of the opposite. Like, there
was climbing back climbing It's it's a loop. Right? So you're not
going the same way. Yeah. And it was
a loop and you're climbing out, and then you're leaning away from a wall, Like, off, kind of off the side of the mountain Okay scenario.
And a few pinch points in there as well. But the entire trail has
fantastic views. Really gorgeous views out down the
valley over, you know, at some point, you can look down at Gold Lakes. There's also a
ton of lakes out there. Once you leave
Gold Lake and you drive up the mountain.
There's a lake right at top and then you drive kinda... When we went counterclockwise. There
was another lake off to the side, and then we drove down and there was another lake and then we drove to snake lake.
Nice. Yeah. And so there's lakes all over
the place. Something it's really kind of a
gorgeous area and you can... If you don't
wanna do the harder trail of snake lake there... You just go drive around and find
a lake thing then, and you can probably camp at it. It's not that big of
a deal out in that area.
There are probably more designated, already prepared camp like, ground, not a campsite site, but, like, a space that people have camped at before camping area source camping area. So don't go
trump and through the weeds or whatever to go.
Create your own campground. Mh. Or campsite site
or disperse camping location. But, yeah, Find somewhere
that somebody else is capped out, and there's probably firing like, rock fire rings already and out there and everything.
But, yeah. This snake lake Loop is a
lot of fun. It's a good good obstacle
definitely a step up from the Gold Lakes entrance.
2, I would say 2 primarily hard obstacles. 1 is the pinch point
for us, which was on the way out, and 1 was the off cam, like, downhill rocky sort of section on the way in.
Look up. And,
you end up at Snake lakes, Snake lake is just a gorgeous, like Mountain lake that's sort of on the side of a like a the mountain.
We drove down almost all the way to the lake, and there was obviously a trail that went down there and on this, like Jetty in place to, like, with multiple vehicles could get down to with multiple fire rock rings and Just an absolute gorgeous scenario with the sun setting, you know, down the mountain from us glowing on the mountains side similar to or barrett.
Yeah. Just... It was a very nice
time of year for us when we went there. I don't remember when it was because
it was, like, 4 years ago.
It was cold though. It, like, froze overnight.
Yeah. When we were there. What was there,
like, in heavy fog super. Yeah. It was... Yeah. It was a
weird day.
Okay. And like, yeah, we had... I think
we got rained on.
We... It was super... I don't think it
was fog. I just think it was, well,
fog is low clouds. But I think it
was just the cloud level was low.
At 1 point, like, we were in the cloud and the sun was setting and, like, the whole sky glow like, it was glowing orange. Oh, that
would be cool. It was rad. I have
such a cool photo. Maybe I'll try to
make it the thumbnail.
From that day, just Bob cad on the side of this hill. Oh, I take it back. There was
another fairly difficult spot on the way up to Snake Lake, but I think it was really only difficult because it was wet.
But it was like, a few sort of ledge that you had to get up. Mh.
Bob Kat did it really. No problem, Brennan
had struggled a little bit. But Brennan also
at that time had a really heavy foot, and so he kept breaking himself loose. And
so I think that's why he was and some problems. Okay. But, yeah. It's a
high mountain granite forest loop, which was absolutely gorgeous.
And for a lot of the trail you're in driving in the forest, which is it's really fun. It's a good... It's a fun loop,
and I would probably say for that you need minimum 30 fives rock protection, and that's about it.
I don't think you really need do a little bit more ground clearance. You just need
the traction there. Okay. Ground clearance and some
good tires. The.
How long does it take to do that loop? It was a while. I would say
it would take all day. Okay. It would...
We're a bunch, like, a solid, like, 6 hours.
Okay. You know, Like, if you're staying at
Gold lakes? Yeah.
And you wheel the loop. Mh.
I think because I think what we did is we drove up there and wheeled all the way to Gold Lake in 1 day.
From our houses in sacramento. Wow. Okay. But
if you're if you're staying in at Gold Lakes and you wanna do the loop. I'd
say it'd be 4 to for a chat 4 to 6 hours. Okay. If you wanna
do the whole thing. Alright. Yeah. I know
that the the Matt Hat did our... They
used do the summer picnic. Yeah. At Gold
lake all the time. So we've done it
once since I've been a member at Mad Hat, And it was. It was a great twice.
Sorry. It's twice since I've been a member
there. And each time they went out and
did the the loop, and I didn't go.
I don't wide. Didn't have the 4 run
each time. But
they were... They left at 8 or 9AM,
8AM, I think, and they were back by 1PM each time. Yeah. So noon 1PM.
So it's 5 hours? Yeah 5 hours here.
So it's a it's just a it's a really cool spot. Like, I wanna get up
and do the snake lick loop section, but I'd love going and just camping at Cold Lake. Yeah. It's such a cool
way right to to just go and camp at. Yeah. It would be fantastic for, like,
a long weekend. Mh. Or you drive up
there on a Friday. Yep. You know, in
the in the morning or whatever or off afternoon and say, like, what everybody has Monday off or whatever. Yeah. Drive up there after
work on a Friday. It... For us in
Sacramento, it takes 3 hours to get there. Mh.
About 2 3... Say to the campground, probably
for sure, 3 ish hours. Yeah.
And then the next day, you can do the loop. Mh. Or hang out or vice
versa the following day. Yeah. And then you
go home on Monday. Yeah. That would be
a great time. Yep. Up there at at
the Gold Lakes. If you wanted to do...
If you wanna drive up their Camp Gold Lakes, wheel the snake lake loop, the next day come back.
Sleep, drive home. That's still a fine day.
It's just a lot... Like, you're not enjoying
Gold Lake. Yeah.
Yeah. It's it's 6 1 way half another
dozen the other. It's what do you wanna
do? Do you wanna sit down, relax and
enjoy the lake Or do you wheel? You
know, that's up to you. However you wanna
attack that. Yeah. So cool spot, lots of
different highlights to that area. Yeah. Absolutely. Before we
go on to the next 1, I thought, I might talk about pork flats a little bit. Okay. Because that all there. Right? It's
outside of Down. You're kind of outside of
down with the gold lakes. It's not... I
would say it's like at the bottom of these mountains. Right? Or you're kind of down
below the mountain pass in this area. But
Poker flats is a cool Man, it's... I... I... We were talking about
it off air. I think it's been 20
years since I've done Poker flats. I think
Bob Cat was still on 30 threes. Or
open open.
Lifted a few inches. U. And was it
was... At that time, it was a piece
of cake. A bob cat. Okay. So I...
You know, if you have a truck on 30 ones.
Like, you might find. You might hit some
deaths. I know you are probably gonna be
fine. I know that there's Subaru that go
through Poker flat. Yeah. So the cool thing
about Poker flats though.
Is it's an old binding trail and road. So it's super it's cobb
s. It's really rocky. It's there's some off
camera stuff. There's a few river 1 river
crossing, maybe 2 river crossings, I can't remember.
There's at least 1 river crossing. Okay. But
when you get out to poker flats, it's an old mining town that's abandoned.
So there's these old buildings and, like, you know, these old foundations and everything around. That's
that's really kinda cool to get to. Yeah.
I'm trying to remember back. Don't quote me
on the times. But from, like Downing, it's
like an hour or so to poker or flat, and then you can come back to Down or you can continue around the loop.
And then from there, it's a long ways, oh, around the Once you're at the...
Once you're on in poker flat, it's a long with. If you got a few hours
of driving the other direction to to loop back around because the trail goes on, and then you get to a, pavement, and then you drive pavement back And I want to say and I I could be completely wrong on this. But I wanna
say that the loop out of poker flat goes past the secret spot. Oh,
that would make sense. That's all kinda of
right in that area kind of that same gym area. So I don't. Once again, it's
been so long and Done it. I don't.
I because I swear the first time we went to the secret spot. I was like,
I've been here. I know where I... I
know that there's something, like, poker flats around this general area. I I think it is.
I haven't done poker flats before, but I've I've looked at... I remember looking it up
and thinking it's up in the Quincy area.
Yeah. That's not Quincy. It's down. Yeah. Well,
I mean, the other...
Because it north from Down, which is North.
North from Down is pretty much quincy area.
Kind of Yeah. But it goes
away.
Okay. Yeah. Got it. I don't know. We'll
have to draw it up on a or something side. We need a Tv instead of.
If if only we had Onyx, available on our phones right now. We this up. Yeah.
But we'd debbie cool to that... Like, if
we had a Tv, that would be something we could Show. And be like, here. What
is. Yeah. Absolutely. Poker is fun. And super
basic.
It's fun to get out to the old guy. Gal, like, gold mining area, and that's
really about all I remember. I really came
in the other way, so I did the long stretched the first day and then went to Poker flats and then Down the second day. Mh. And I just remember a lot
of like, river rock that you're just driving across for hours.
Okay. Like, and I was... And you don't
like those trails. Oh, well, and big like
there like, basketball size. Yeah. You know, rocks that,
you know, you just... Is it worse than
what more springs? Oh, yeah. Oh jeez. So
okay That... Well, the problem with went where
Springs is that they're, like, softball size rocks. Maybe a little
bigger. Okay. That are just
annoying...
It's annoying that you... It looks flat enough
that you can drive fast, but you should can't.
The this trail on the way out was messed up enough that you know you can't drive fast. Okay. And you shouldn't because it's
just bat, like, the... It's really really rocky.
Yeah. But it's not a challenge of Rocky.
Right? It's such a, like, a difficult Rocky
section. Okay. It's just rocky, and you just
go straight. And
You just bounce along. Okay. We went with
a stock Chevy Tahoe.
Okay. And it did fine. Yeah. I think
there was, like, 1 of the sections coming out of the river.
Because a lot of people go from Down 2 poker flats and then you drop into the river there. But since we went the
other way, there was a climb out of the river, and I think that was the only spot.
Okay. That's like 20 years ago. 20 years
ago. I wonder what the t looks like
now it... Yeah. It I might be completely
different and where I might be completely lying now. But It's the next 4 now and
people are sending Subaru up there. Yeah. Right.
Yeah. I wonder what color it it is
on Op. Look at that before you go
on the trail. Yeah.
Alright. Coming down the line. Strawberry pass, both
of us have done this in the fair recent future. Or masks since. Cal.
Yeah. And neither of us have done it
since Cal. The Cal fire we're talking about.
Yeah. Massive fire went to right through that
trail, and they turned to the trail into a fire line that didn't hold in in some parts. So Yeah. The whole
t got bull dose, but I did hear an update on it recently. Oh, good. The
trail is in good condition. The all... It's
still bull, the club that maintains it has not been able to go in and remake the obstacles yet.
But there's a couple obstacles being made due to water erosion. Okay. In the area. So
it's very easy to get through stock core by fours can get there pretty much just fine. In my opinion the all to strawberry
pass?
Is the lookout area. Absolutely. That looks down
over. I think it's Highway 88.
Yeah. The strawberry goes Yes. 88. Yeah. Strawberry
pass is a pass that goes between highway 88 and highway 80?
50. 50. Thank you. Yeah. 50 to 88
is strawberry, and then 80 824 is Deer Valley.
So... Okay. Yeah. And it's... So if you
come up the 88 side and go right behind mind, there's a... What was... What a
mill? What is that? It's a is that?
It's on the lake? Is it's it's a
power station.
Power station lake there. It's gonna it's gonna
come back to me 1 remote talk to this. But anyways, you go in that way,
you climbing. You're climbing climbing climbing pretty steep
climb for a mile 2 mile or something like that, and then you pop up up at the top of this kind of big... I wanna
say, open granite area, but it says open ish area with some big granite rocks and just overlook the whole valley where highway 88 is.
And it's a really cool observation area to go up and have lunch at cables. Cables.
Thank you. Yep. Cape lake.
So you can go up there, and that in my opinion is the all lure to strawberry. Other than other than that, it's a
way to get between Highway 88 and Highway 50.
If you don't wanna go all the way and around in into Nevada and come down or all the way down through Sacramento and go back up. Yeah. So Now it's probably
you can traverse it probably in a stock tacoma.
Third long, 4 or long bed, you can probably do the trail. Well, we took we
took Corey, la less Corey through in his fore runner. Yeah. That had an e locker
in the rear and was on 30, 31 inch cars and sliders and sliders. Yeah. So we took
that, but and now was before the fire.
Yes. That was before the fire. I'm gonna
go with it was harder than. Mh. Granted
neither of us have been up since the fire. Mh. But, absolutely, the the all of
that trip is there was a few hard obstacles that there's a few climbs, but the grand jury, the grandeur.
Grandeur. Yeah not a grand jury. Greg grandeur.
Of that trail is that lookout point at the very tip top. So if you wanna
make it an easy lookout trip, then go up 88, if you wanna do a little bit of off road, go to go up 50. 50 drag. Yep. It's a
it's a fun little trail off right off the beaten path. Mh. So it's it wasn't
that bad. Yeah.
The club that maintains it, once they get it, the bull dosing undone, their goal is to maintain it at a pretty medium to easy level. It's not gonna be
a forest road, but it's gonna be easier than Slick rock or Deer Valley. Shares the
goal. So... Yeah. Some so it'll be 30
ones with a law. Yeah. Yep. That makes
sense. There wasn't that... I mean, Bob cat
blinked an eye at it, you know, isn't a very difficult trail. But if you're in
30 ones and no lockers, you'd would have to choose some of your lines. Yep. Yep next 1
down our list here is Niagara Rim. Yeah.
Can we do this 1 next because it's really more in our area.
We... It's in, you know, like, that's in
the same, same historical area. Same general area
kind of a strawberry pass. It's really more...
It's closer to the Rub.
To anything. Yep.
So we're we're talking about Hell hole. Yeah. We've
trying of... We've talked about Hell hole in
the past.
Brennan from Trail 4 runner, and I have done hell whole halfway. U. Because we, ran
out of time and we had to go get the mini assistant. I think it was
or do something with the assistant.
So we had to turn around, but and we turned around right at the difficult spot, So I drove down half of the difficult spot turned around, drove back up it. Yeah.
But I would say that, Hell hole, I I don't worry how how long would you say hell hole is? I think it's 3
and a half miles. Yeah. It's not very
long. Nope Yeah.
It's would be a very tight wine theory... Yeah.
I was gonna go with that. It's a
very tight wine trail. I don't, I was
gonna say, if you ran into oncoming traffic, there would be... It's very difficult to get
around very difficult to get around people. Yeah.
I would... It definitely is a smaller vehicle
friendly you know, mini truck, a older style Jeep.
Mh. You know, nothing. I would not take
a full size down that thing. Yeah. There's...
Gladiators do have difficulty getting through that trail.
Yeah. And just making because it's they're corners.
You... Yeah. It's hard to take those corners.
My dad's truck had a couple issues in some spots, not because it's rocky and the truck wasn't capable is because of the the tightness of the trail. Yeah.
Absolutely. And I know that the...
So I have only been, like, halfway down the trail. The part of the problem I
would say with Hell, and we've talked about this too. Is that it's far out. And
it's not like, really that far out. I
mean, it's probably as the crow flies from Sacramento. It's probably closer than the Rub. Yeah.
But Yeah. There's right about so easy way
to get there. It's all back country roads.
It's all things that have, you know, nobody really cares about. They're falling in and just
repair. Roots are making them random speed bumps
squirrels and pine cones all over the place.
Yeah. You know, hot holes everywhere,
and the fire did roar through that, general area of couple these going to the trail.
Mh. So there's you know, the the roads
I have seen better better days. U. The
road gets washed out a lot because there's no vegetation left to hold the the hillside together.
And so it keeps getting wash outs, taking out sections of the road. Yeah. So...
So it takes a while to get there, and then you're on the really narrow Windy trail on the way down to the lake, Mh. Which I never made it to. But
I got to the hard section, the hard section, when I was there was pretty legit.
Mh.
It would have been still fun time trying to get the fore runner down without hurting that thing. Yeah. But... And I didn't get
to the Ledge, which supposedly the ledge are a lot of fun as well. They're fun.
They're... They look worse in my opinion, the
the Creek section that you got to you.
That's harder than the Ledge are. Okay. The
ledge look more intimidating, but you have a ton of traction. Sure. So they're not really
that difficult. Whereas creek area is this kinda
of muddy and wet all the time.
And traction can be really hard to come by. And it's this really tight turn up
against a tree it's its root system, so you blow out windows, quarter panel windows, You bend in dent quarter panels, and it's a really tight turn in off camera. It throws
you over into the tree. So
it's... And it's... There's no traction either. So
it's it's an interesting combination of stuff. Right?
It's 1 of those that... Once that tree
goes, because be it eventually will will. Yeah.
You get so many people driving past it.
Yeah. That that corners not to be very
difficult. No. So if you want a difficult
time on Hell hole. Mh. Hit it before
that tree goes away, which it's been there a long time, but it's a big tree.
Every vehicle that goes through that corner, is just digging that root ball out a little bit more and a little bit more. Yeah.
It's it's a short trail. So you can
do it pretty quick. It's a nice day
trip. You're gonna spend more time driving tune
from the trail than you will doing the trail itself. By
Okay. Quite a big margin.
So, but what's cool about Hell hole and the draw to Hell hole in my opinion is getting down to the reservoir and the lake when it's empty. For hell whole reservoir.
It's... When it's full, the trail literally ends
in going into the water, And so there's no place to camp at the end of the trail. Okay. And there's
only 2 spots to camp on the trail, and both spots can only hold, like, 3 vehicles each.
Wow. So they're okay. Really limited camping spots
on the trail, if the reservoir full, if the reservoir is empty, there's tons of camping ability down in the reservoir. There's just no
shade.
But what's really cool once the reservoir is empty is it's a giant playground.
Yeah. So it could just rock says rock
everything everywhere that you can go play on, and it's really freaking cool. That's the lure to
Hell hole. So, like, in my opinion, don't
go to hell hole early in the season.
Right now, you could have because they're doing repairs on the dam at Hell reservoir. So
so the reservoir is empty, they're keeping an empty until they get those repairs done. So
maybe 1 or 2 more years.
But after that, early in the season, the reservoir will be full. And it's not... No.
It's not fine in my opinion.
So to the take that How you wanna take it? Cool. Alright.
I strike that 1. I moved it down
there. Oh, because I think these... These these
are all really more... They're all closer to
each other. Right? True. So we'll get to
that. So I guess the next 1 down
the list now. Is Bear Valley, 0HV? Yeah.
Have... When was the last time you were
there? It's been
Think 2 years.
Okay. I... You might have have... You might
have me beat. I don't remember when it
was, but I went on the ladies run with the Mad Hat. Yep. The assistant... I've
been there since let that lady's in. Okay.
Yeah Yeah. The assistant drove all day long.
U. And then, it was misty,
and then we got back to the camp and it we set up camp and everything because we took Bob cat, and we had rooftop 10 on Bob. So we got back
to camp. We set up camp. We went
and hung out by the fire the and it was, like, wasn't quite rent dr, but it wasn't quite like, mist. It was like, that heavy
mist, you know? Mh. Mh. And I ever
forgot the rain fly. Oh, that was that
trip. Yeah. That's right. And so it like,
was raining inside the tent. Yep. U. It
was the first time that we noticed that there was a... I know, the waterproofing is
disappearing on that time. Yeah. U. Remember for
that now. Yeah. So, their value
v is up Highway 89 9. And it's pretty much the opposite
turn from Meadow Lake.
Yeah. Yeah. R right. Yeah. Right. That same
intersection. You would turn,
if you're going up, Highway 89. From Trucking
from Truck to Sierra.
You would turn left to go Meadow lake, or you turn right.
To go to Bear Valley Oh fee.
Is it right there?
It is. No. Yeah. I think it is.
It's it was... It's just further than where
we did your bachelor part. So I was
I was trying to think I was like, usually, when I go up there, though, I'm I'm driving for a little ways from the camping area. I realized I can't put
the little niagara campsite sites. Or little truck, little tricky campsite.
And so, yeah. Then you go further up
and it's right across that same intersection. Yeah.
As met electronic pretty sure. Yeah. So you
turn right, you go back that way a little ways. And then I think you're pretty
much in it. I don't... There's no like,
gate. There's my knowledge. There's no gate. You're
pretty much go down. There's a, a couple
of camping dispersed camping areas, and you'll will eventually actually end up at a big 4 way intersection where there's an Oh campground. And Oh campground
just looks like a giant field park trailers. Kinda. Got it. Yeah. And
you take a right right there, and that's the start of the official start of the, Bay valley Oh xv. Okay. The cool thing
about Bear value H is you get to drive through Truck.
So there's there's some great food, grape breweries, some good beer options in trucking. Chuck is
just an awesome little town to stop and visit for half an hour and hours you're driving through.
Absolutely. Yeah. But the nice thing about the
trail itself is that it's 2 loops.
Yeah. It's a system of 2 loops, and
so you can do 1 loop 1 day. The other loop the
other day, or you can do Yeah. 1 loop been both and 1 both
1 and then now do the other loop.
Yeah. There's a lot options on how to
run that trail.
And in between the 2 loops, there's a a kind of a bailout out access point.
So, lots of different ways to run that trail.
There's obstacles on the trail, and they're called Chill. They're tenant they're labeled like 4 dice,
Chill 1, 2 Windshield 3. Remember that. But
every Chill does have a bypass. Yeah. So,
if you don't wanna do the chills, they're not difficult chills like 4 dice. No. No.
They're definitely a light year's lower in difficulty than the chills on Ford ice. But they're
they're good enough hills that you gotta pay attention when you're going up, even in a rig like Bob cat or my 4 runner, you still gotta pay attention to tire placement, everything.
But they're very they're for the most part, low risk obstacles. There's 1 obstacle that has a really
tight steep turn 90 degree turn, pretty much, at the very top of this climb, that 1, I've seen people come very close to rolling. And if you roll down that,
you're rolling for a ways. Oh, okay. So
that 1 would be the really the only high risk medium risk obstacle.
The rest of them are pretty low risk.
You just Do you got the balls to go up it? Yeah. Yeah. I know when
we did it years ago that maybe it was before Covid when we did it? I don't remember when I was.
Anyways, the assistant drove the entire day, she did fantastic, and we got to 1 of the chills, and I think once somebody on the radio came across and it was, like, This is the hardest part of the trail.
Yeah. So if you wanna go up that,
then you go driver, if you wanna do the bypass, you go passenger. You know? And I was like, which
way do you wanna go? And she's like,
I wanna go that way. Driver. Okay. Let's
go.
I hopped out and, like, driver her passenger driver passenger got her up the trail. No
problem. I think at 1 point she hit
a diff and we had a back just a little bit. But it wasn't
wasn't hard with a spotter at all. Yeah. So I
would say if you're doing the hard lines, 30 fives with a rear locker. Yeah.
Yeah. That's all you really need. And if
you're doing an e the easy lines, stock. Yeah. Mh. Stock v. Stock. 4 by
4. You don't even really need a lift
on it. You don't even need bumper. Yeah.
There's 1 little rock garden that I don't think has a bypass.
Okay. And so that 1, you just... If
you don't have a lift, you're gonna you're gonna hit your rocker panels. So have some
sliders. Sliders. Mh. But if you got sliders,
a stock 4 by 4 can make it through that. Just fine. Yeah. And there's some
really cool views on the up per loop has some really nice lookout cool views. The
lower loop is more of the obstacles kind of thing. Okay. So Yeah. The only
thing I would say about that trails is that the trail is very narrow. Yes. And
there is lots of mans anita around So you will get scratches. Yep. There's there's
no, pins strip. Yeah. Absolutely. Sierra and strip first.
Sure. Yep. So if you don't wanna scratch
your vehicle, you don't wanna scratch the paint, you're worried about it, then this is not the trail for you. Mh. If you don't
care that much, and you're okay with a little scrape piece scrape here and there, then it's still a very fun beginner trail to hit. Yeah. We're sorry. If
you're if you're thinking and wanna learn more about off road, this is a great 1 to go in attempt. This is... This is
actually when I was getting into it and trying to get more people into operating, so I could have more people to go wheel with. It was 1 of
the trails I took Newbies too. Yeah. Because
it is... It's a great learning trail. There's
there's a lot of difficulty variation Mh throughout both of them, and there's lots of different ways to do the trial.
So you can go back to the trial 3 or 4 times and do it a different wage each time. Sure. That makes... Yeah.
That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. It's
fun. Yeah.
So that one's fun. That one's up outside
a truck, in the truck area. Yeah. In
Northern California, Both... So Hell Hole and bear Valley. We
didn't really say best times a year to go. Mh. Bear valleys right up there with
Meadow Lake and in high parts of the Sierra, so that's snow dependent.
So once the the snow is down, then I would say you can go.
I would check the Fee park just to make sure that it's clear and open. Yep.
If you tell... You have a trailer and
you do show logistics. There's trailer parking up
there? Yep. If you wanna go up there
and camp, there's awesome campground grounds just south Down Highway 89 called little truck campground grounds, and there's an upper and a lower. Yeah. And, both 1 the
upper 1 has group campsite site, I believe, Where's the lower.
I don't remember which 1. There's a group
campsite at 1 of them, but they're within a mile of each other, and they're right on the truck River. Yeah So some gorgeous
camping right on a river creek side. It
is also right on highway 89.
So you do get car noise at night.
But you get the nice little swimming hole during the day. If you're in the yeah.
In summer. So And the river really drown
out a lot of it. Yeah. Unless it's
like a harley or Bro or or something then that you hear.
But if it's just a car, you know, you got the river roaring next to you.
It's not that loud. Yep. Hell hole, I'm
pretty sure it has gate.
And they have a close and open season as well. Mh. So,
you can probably just Google it. I forgot
who runs the Jeep Auburn Jeep Club. No.
It's the Sacramento goat mountain Goats, Sec Sexy city, Mountain Goat, sec Yeah. So Go to the People that did
goat smoke at Citrix. Right. Back 2 years
ago. Yeah. Yeah. So, you can probably check
out their website or talk to them. I
think it's also another fairly high elevation trail that does get snow, but it's not high enough that the snow lingers for a really long time. If you're going early in
the season to Hell, I will say this, take a chainsaw all with you. 100 percent.
Yeah. So cool. You have a high chance
we'll get locked in by a tree coming down. So... Yes. Absolutely. Alright. What, next 1
down is Sour grass, which is a trail that I've never done. Oh interesting. Yeah. I've
done it a few times. It's
nothing to write home about. It's another 1
kinda like Bear Valley. A great, great beacon
beginner trail. Okay? It's not difficult.
Has a fun little river crossing? Yeah. That's
what I was gonna say that River crossing looks a little difficult?
It's gotten very difficult in the past year 2 years. Okay. There's tons of people
going on Style grass, and it's a really short trail. It's might be as long as
hell whole. Wow, shorter, but it's easier than
Hell hole.
So because of that, you get a lot of newbies in there that are open open, and they go and do the the river crossing and can't get up out of the river and just dig holes. Yeah. So the
the holes on either side of the river crossing are getting really big right now, and people are just tearing it up. So
The trail itself is not that difficult, but the water crossing is very difficult right now.
Please either have lockers front and rear and use them as you're going across the river or or win if you're open open, don't sit there and intake. Yeah. On that river
bed place. So... So what's at the... What's
past that? All I ever see of pictures
of sour grass or videos this as people going through that tiny river crossing that's on this... That downhill side. Pretty much it. Is
there camping back there? There's camp big camping
area. Okay and in, it's kinda neat little
tree grove. Mh. And then you can go
a little bit further. So right on the
other side of the river it kinda loops around as a big loop, it comes back to the river.
There is a section if you don't go over the river and you continue down the trail itself. I believe you can go
pretty far back another half a mile.
Okay far. And end up in this really
cool tree grove area that does have quite a bit of camping. It's all open, dispersed
camping.
So whoever your neighbors are, you're gonna be with them. But it's a it's a pretty
cool little tree grove. I don't think I
would camp there, choose to camp there.
I would like to... I like going there
and just having lunch.
Got it. Or go up there what I
really like to do is go up there for a day trip.
To slick rock, and then come back out.
Maybe go run sour grass and then go to room for lunch. The what? The room
a lube room, Jimmy, that sounds like you have to be 18 and older to join.
You probably should. That place can get interesting.
No. It's a it's the. It's a a
bar restaurant up there. Yeah.
It's I'm trying to think of what the German place that the Matt Hat stay at?
No. Oh, okay. No. I don't know where
that is. The room is that's a it's
a American bar food. So burgers,
steak, stuff like that, but it is some of the best burgers, you will ever find on Highway 4. Okay? So the lube and
it's an down them, they just lube their way out. Yeah. They are, yep. Nice and
greasy.
Some good stuff. They started redoing the outdoor
area.
Past couple years. So they have a really
nice deck in the back of the building now. Big deck? It's a big deck. Yep.
It's covered. They've got heating during the winter.
They've got fans and stuff out there during the summer.
And then I believe they're building a stage to do live music. I haven't been there
since Yeah.
They had... I think were just starting it.
So I don't know if they've finished it at all, but lube room, the lube room is about 10 minutes from the board's crossing turn off.
Highway 4 that used to get up to Sour grass, from boards crossing. It's 05:10 minutes
is the blue room. Okay. So look that
up if you're looking for some amazing burgers on highway 4. They're right there by Sa?
Never heard of it. Oh, god. You gotta
go there. It's amazing. All go. Lube myself
up at the loop broom. Yep.
Cool. Alright. Well, I guess the rest of
this list I actually have not been to.
I've never been to Pure so H with next in our list. Mh. I know exactly
where it is. Yeah. But I've I've never
stayed away. That's the only... I've always heard
that it's a fantastic camping area. So in
my opinion, Pure H, the the draw to it is the camping. Right? There's not there's
not any difficult obstacles. It's not an obstacle
trail to go to. You're going there to
camp. Yeah. And the the cool thing about
Pure is that it's... The the main camp, it's a big
camping area. Right? With a lot of different
variation to camp sites. Okay? The cool campsite
sites, the awesome ones are right down on a ginormous gravel bed on a creek bed. Okay. So
it's a it's where the river used to be wider, more flowing, whatever it is and created this massive gravel bed there. And now it's a lot smaller.
And so there's just tons of gravel everywhere and the river kinda of splits and snakes around through the gravel area. So there's a
couple little spots to cross the river throughout the gravel area, but It's a big open kinda camping area. There are designated campfire
fire rings. Yes. So it's safe to have
campfire fires in if they're not banned in Tahoe National Forest so check that before you go. But it's a the camping on that
gravel bar. That's what you go to pure
before. Okay. Yeah. Cool. And then, if you
wanna go run 4 ice and go play around on drive line Hill or go up to Eagle Lakes and go down and check and do some fishing Eagle Lakes the other high sierra lakes around that area. It's a
great kind of base camp area for Ford ice as well. Yes.
That's that's fine. And I know that they're,
like, hand you know, fist next to each other Super close. Literally, the the...
1 of the trails... There's 2 trails into
Pure. 1 of them comes off of the
access road to Ford ice, and the other 1 comes off of Ford ice itself. Right.
You could literally literally really swing a cat and hit it. Yeah. Throw a cat across
the room and hit the pure B. Yeah.
So pure Be really cool for camping, not difficult trail wise anything, not no obstacles, Just really cool camp area. You don't wanna
camp in the middle of the Creek on that gravel bed. There are other places throughout
the trail system to a camp. Right. So... And it's a
great fantastic spot to set up and have, like, a base camp for Forward ice. Yes. Yep. Ford dice or even,
you know, if you wanna go up a single peak. Yep. Just kinda have to go
around into Ford ice and then come out 4 ice and then go up signal peak. Yeah.
But totally nice basically to pierce from Bowman.
I don't know. It's a good question. I've
never tried or looked at that. Ben could
probably tell us. Ben over. Yep. Call in
or just tell me. 1 or the other.
If you can get go that out. Yep.
I wanna... I've never gone
farther down that road than the turn off to Paradise.
Okay. So like... Yeah, like, I know it's
down there. Mh. I just... Oh, I'm going
on, Eagle Lakes Road. And and here's the
Ford ice turn off. Yep. That's that's as
far as I've been. Yeah. So the eagle
lakes even down there. I don't... I've never
even bend the Eagle lakes. I don't know.
Eagle Eagle Lakes is is it just after drive?
Or before drive line. The turn off for
4 lakes 4 drive line... I think you
can get to Eagle lakes down the road more. Down towards pure Pure o H. Really?
I I think so. Okay. Because I don't
think you need to drive line.
I don't... Know. I think you can turn
off...
I don't remember. The the the last time
I accidentally... We turned the very first time,
I think it was the very very first time I went to 4 ice. We went
the wrong way, and we started going to eagle eggs. Oh, okay. And then from then
on, I know that it's this turn you don't go that way. You go this
way continue on Ford. Yeah. But I don't
remember right now where it's at.
But I think you can get access Eagle further down Eagle lakes road. Interesting. Eagle Lakes
road, that kinda dead ends Last time I checked.
But you can get to pierce down Eagle right. So kinda dead ends and loops around
into the trail system that used to access pierce.
And I think it's private property at the end of it. Yeah. So... But I haven't
explored enough to be able to give a exact solid answer. Yeah. So Yeah. I don't
know either.
Anyway, so... Yeah. Mh. Eagle Lakes is a
fun area. And there's a few other lakes
there. The only way that I know how
to get there is from turning off of Ford. 4 turn off the staging area.
So that's Pierce Me in the last 1.
Niagara where. Micro rim. This is a trail
that I actually really really enjoy. Okay?
I no Lions butt. Lions butt. It's a
cool area dude. It's a it's a sweet
player area. Okay. I
take... I... Let me take that back. I've
driven across niagara.
Oh, okay. To get to a lookout point
out on by Pine crust. Okay. But and
we cry, I think we crossed it or drove on it for, like, a very short period of time. There was a good lookout
point. Yeah. So you went up to lookout
point and then came back down. Yeah. Okay.
So, yeah. The cool thing about Niagara Rim,
1 of the cool things is very similar to Bear Valley O. Right? Okay. It's 2
loops.
Oh, And so... And in the middle is
an access point that you can use to come in and out for the bottom of the top loop or the top of the bottom loop. Got it. And so it's... There's
the 3 different access points for the entire trail.
The upper trail in my opinion is more scenic. Right? You have the observation lookout,
which is fantastic. It's a really cool observation
out. And then as you get down
into and start approaching the second loop, you get the some of the obstacles like Heartbreak break hill, which is very intimidating. It's just a loose really
steep dirt incline or decline. Oh, So Okay. It's...
If you're going up at, it's it's a tough climb because it's loose dirt and your front end gets really light. Got it. If
you're going down heartbreak hill, they named it because you are standing on your brakes, your tires are not turning and you're still going downhill. You're sliding downhill.
That. Yes.
Yeah. Like truck hill and a h. Yeah.
It's very similar in steep to truck hill Not nearly as calls truck hill. Sure. But
steep ness and loose dirt like Truck hill?
Yeah. So heartbreak hills is an interesting 1.
What is the other 1 side wall, suicide.
Okay. I like the names. It's a fun...
They've got some fun names for this place.
And it's just it's a really tight turn right next to Lava rock.
And so you just have to stay as far away from the lava rock as you can. If you don't, you're gonna slash side
wall. Yep. And then there's a cup no
way out. Is another 1. So if you're
going in that and descending, it's really hard to come out, because it's all lava rock, but it's like, almost polished lava rock at this point, with some interesting ledge in it. And so
it's just if you get down to the bottom, it's hard to come back up out of it, so they call no way out.
Just keep going forward it. Right. Yeah. Not
a difficult trail by any means. The obstacles
are not really difficult and all the obstacles I'd believe have bypass.
A heartbreak kill may not have a bypass.
I might I'm gonna hold off on that 1. But
Side Suicide has a bypass.
I don't think no way out has a bypass either.
But Not a really difficult trail. You can do
it with 33 in a locker. You don't
need a ton of ground clearance. That trail.
The the tricky parts of that trail are more traction games Yeah. Sure. So having lockers really
helps a lot. You can do the whole
trail with lockers front and rear and not have any issues. But what's really neat about
that trail.
Are the play areas. Right. That's what I've
heard that Yeah. Like, the trails is 1
thing, but there's a lot of play areas off to the sides. Mh. So, kinda in
the middle of the top, as you're coming around halfway through the top trail, I believe is an area called Lions butt.
And it's funny. It's named to that because
it's... They're making fun of lions back in
Moa, Moa. Because, in Moa, there's lot of
really high traction slick rock. Right? The sands stone out there.
This play area lines butt is a ton of just open granite that has a choose your adventure lines everywhere. Okay. And there's
1 granite rock there that kinda is shaped like the back end of a lion with a bush in the middle.
Okay. So it looks like a lion's butt.
Got it. When you're looking at it Sure.
Sure.
But there's a a couple really fun climbs there. There's some little spots where you can
just get down and twisted as you're coming down and descent, but a tight turn you gotta turn out of it.
There's a lot of choose your adventure granite traction games to play with your vehicle.
Cool. And the lines about play area. Yeah.
And then there's the rocket pile rock, rock area. I think it's called. That is
another play area, and it is more like moon rocks.
In granite. So there's a couple of big
v notches to play on, and then a couple of just big granite walls that really the bug go play on. Yeah.
Sure. Because there is a very high chance
you are rolling your rig if you go play on the granite walls.
But the v notches are pretty fun. They're
very intimidating, but most vehicles can do the v notches.
It's just how good are you at doing v notches. Sure. But it's a it's... The
the rock pile is the bigger play area.
You're gonna want bigger tires, bigger axles. You're
gonna bind up axle shafts. Do not take
Dana 30 fives to the rock area, whereas lines, but that's really good for anybody. You
can find something to play in your vehicle there no matter what vehicle you have. Okay.
But the rock area, you definitely want better geared more capable vehicles if you wanna go play there. Got it. But there's 2
different play areas with a really neat trail with some fun obstacles with a gorgeous lookout, and there's an Oh camping area and a regular camping area right off of pretty much the main highway.
What is that 01:08? 1 0. Highway 01:08.
It's up in the pine crust area. Right.
So The shitty part about Na is how long it takes to get out there. It's just
in the middle of nowhere. In the middle
of nowhere. It takes rails raining really. There's
a ton of fire roads around it. U.
I've done a fire road out in that area from more or less Pine crust lake, to almost Son nora. Oh fire road. Wow. That
was a lot of fun. Yeah. We ended
at the cider.
Okay. I'm drawing a blink of the name.
That the 1 that there's the metal bottles?
Yes.
Indigenous. Yes. Indigenous cider. I was about to
y'all all the secretary. Yeah. It's such a
good little spot. Yep. But that's also out
in the middle of nowhere. It takes you
a while. Like,
20 minutes outside of son or something like...
Yeah. But that was fun. We did that.
There's tons of fire roads out in that area. And then there is the lake.
Pine crust lake, which is a lot of fun. And then, yeah, there's Niagara further up
the highway. Yeah. So and I go to
Pine crust a lot, but I usually don't I never take bob cat out there. So
I don't really ever go wheel in that general area. Okay. But I think I'm gonna
have to 1 of these days because It's definitely a trail out there. It's so... It's
it is 1 of my top favorite trails.
It might be, you know, right behind Rub con. So Barrett Lake Rub on the Niagara
or rim for me now. Okay. But I
hate going out to it. It just so
far out, It takes me 5, 5 and a half hours to get there. Yeah. And
there's no easy way to get to it no matter where you're coming from. No. And
so it... But it is... It's a really
fun trail. It's a gorgeous trail.
There's a spot. I think you would really
enjoy. There's I supposedly the oldest juniper tree
in California that they found. Oh, is right
out by the trail so you can drive past Niagara Rim and go and visit the oldest Juniper tree, and there's a a dude that lives out there and tells you all about it. Oh, wow. Yeah. Okay. So that's
kinda of fun for the the the plant and tree lovers out there. Hold h culture. Yeah. The
h. Yeah. But yeah. It's a it's a
cool little spot in the camping area. If
you do the the regular campground, It's a pretty sweet little campground. It's not
big. It holds about 15 vehicles maybe,
and it's first come first served paid camping.
And then there's a... Is an Oh v
area if you wanted to bring a trailer.
Okay. So... Cool. Yeah. I know that it's
a it's a gorgeous area too. It's up
in the mountains.
You're pretty much at the peak. I mean,
you're on the rim, The mountain. Yep. So, I mean, weather
dependent all weather could change very quick out that direction. Yeah.
But, you know, it definitely snows up there, so when's a good time to go. I
mean, you're looking at summertime time. Also probably,
I would say it gets hot out there too. So that's hot out there. I I'd
say early summer or late summer would be a great times to be out in that direction. Are there any water sources up at
the top. Not really on the trail up
at the top. There's not a whole lot
of water, Not no real creek, the...
Regular campground is near a Creek. It's not
right on the Creek, but it's within a 2 minute drive. Yeah. You wanted to go
over to the Creek and take a quick dip. Yeah. I would probably say that if
you're going up in that area, it'd be probably your best bet to camp around Pine Chris Lake. And that'd be fun. You...
It's probably 30 minutes up the road. We're gonna guess
20 30. Yeah. To to kinda generally start
the trail. Yeah. And so... You know, that's
not gonna be a bad little trip there.
And then when you're done, you know, you just drive back to the lake. Yeah. Hang
out. A lot of camping around Pine Chris
Lake. There's a few good campground grounds. They're
not right on the lake for the most part, but there's tons of camping in the general area and then getting to the lake is super easy, lots of parking around.
Right up on the water there, at, Pine Chris Lake and a lot of, like, picnic tables and picnic lake as well. Yeah. It's
also a general store kind... Well,
Snack shack. I'll go with. Okay. On the
lake where you can get some ice cream or snacks or whatever is? Yeah. It's a
fun little lake. Sweet. I I've never stayed
a point Chris like before. So... Yeah. Pine
crust is pretty pretty full little area. There's
also shoot 5 mile hike around the entire lake. Oh, right? You're pretty much like on...
Almost the shore. And on the backside, you're
kind of on some, like granite cliff fish areas. Okay. Not dangerous at all. There's even
railings up. To just safety factors, but it's
a it's a fun, very doable hike if you're okay with hiking and some small amount of heights Okay. Cool. But. I wouldn't I would not
advise, like, a grandma or a grandpa in dyke. Unless their fit and willing to do
it. Because you are at elevation too.
Yeah. So you're get to the other side
of the lake and you're do doing a little bit of actual climbing. Mh. I wouldn't
say scaling. You're not hands and knees or,
you know, or hands and feet climbing up a mountain. But... You are hu and Puff
at some of the backside. Okay. Yeah. So,
I think that does it for our trail stuff. I think we're gonna come back. Can
do 1, maybe 2 more episodes on some areas. Other areas we've been
wheel at, and we can kinda give our opinion about what we love about them. Okay
Yeah. We definitely have... I I foresee us
talking about the Fresno general area. Mh.
I've only wheeled 1 trail. Out in that
area. I know Tyler's done a whole bunch
because he grew up down there. So maybe
we'll cover some of those trails. And then
I foresee us talking about pull possibly Johnson Valley a little bit and maybe a little bit of Moa. So we'll see how much
more we can get into. Yep. Cool. So
it does it. And hopefully, this podcast this
Youtube is gives you guys some information. If
you're looking at some of these trails or you've heard about Hell hole or heard about niagara or rim before and you've always been like Wanna go check that trail out. Yeah.
Help us give you guys some insight and some of the the positives and the lure to those trails, and you can decide if you really wanna go check those out or not. So
we'll continue it later on down the road, and, hopefully, everybody enjoys their week. Hopefully you guys
had a great weekend.
Jimmy, if they wanna get in contact with us to give us feedback. Maybe tell a
little bit about Charles mayer area. How can
they do that? Yeah. You can find us
over on Instagram. I'm at Sn trail 4
by 4 Tyler's app 4 by 4 Toyota to tyler. You can email us, jimmy or
tyler at snail trail 4 by 4 dot com, or you can phone in and talk to us for over the internet and ways like that and we'll play your message on our snail episodes. That phone number is area code 9163454744.
Don't stop driving now because it's in the show notes so you can grab it at time. Perfect.
With that, Jimmy, any final words for everybody out there.
I liked this chunk of trails that we just covered because I really think that it's more of the basic side of the trail.
So you don't need anything extravagant. You don't
need a wild rig to go and do them. I think if you just got you
and a buddy and you have some decent rock protection, all these trails that we've listed today are a fun trail to do with a friend.
percent. And with that my friends.
Keep crawling.
I got 1 for you. K.
Ready. Why
would you never iron, a 4 leaf clover.
Why would you never iron a 4 leaf clover, iron, a 4 leaf clover.
Iron A4I don't know. Why? Because you don't
wanna press your luck. God ding, Jimmy.
Okay. Don't press at Tyler.
About this episode
Tyler and Jimmy Jet run through Northern California trail “high points,” mixing practical guidance with campfire-style stories. They start at Gold Lakes (easy access to the lake, a tougher 4x4 campground gatekeeper obstacle, and the Snake Lake loop with pinch points, off-cam downhill, and big views). They then cover Poker Flats, Strawberry Pass (post-Cal Fire updates), Hell Hole (tight trail to a reservoir playground when empty), Bear Valley OHV (two-loop system with bypasses and beginner-friendly learning lines), and more—Sour Grass, Puer/“Pure” camping for Fordyce base-camp, and Niagara Rim (scenic lookout plus traction-focused play areas like Lions Butt).
Original notes
There are many smaller trails in Northern California and Jimmy and Tyler talk about some of their favorites. They discuss the Gold Lakes area down to Niagra Rim with lots of trails in between. Most of these trails are in the Sierra Mountain range consisting of granite rock with high-elevation forest.
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