WUD WHEELERS
September 2005 Run
Ahtanum
September 24th, 2005
On the morning of Saturday September 24th, 2005, 8 rigs left the WUD Wheelers cabin (Near Tampico, Washington) and ran up the Ahtanum Mid Fork Rd. (A2000). Our first stop was at Eagle Nest Vista. At Eagle Nest there is a great view over looking the North Fork Ahtanum. The elevation of Eagle Nest Vista is over 6000 feet above sea level.
The next stop was Darland Mountain. This is a great place to look at the volcanic mountains. On a clear day from Darland Mountain you can see Mt Rainier, Mt. St Helens, Mt Adams, Mt. Hood and Mt. Jefferson. The elevation of Darland Mountain is 6981 feet above sea level.
After a view of all the mountains we headed for the North Fork Ahtanum Rd.(A3000) and on down to the Blue Lake cut-off. On the Blue Lake cut-off trail there are some small hill climbs that we had to take to get up to Trail 615.
Once we got up to Trail 615, we took a right and headed to Blue Lake. The elevation of Blue Lake is 6202 feet above sea level.
After having lunch at Blue Lake, half the rigs headed back to the cabin and the other half head on up the trail for more adventure. I chose the adventure. We left Blue Lake and climbed Trail 615 on up to FS1020 near Blue Slide Lookout. (Slide Lookout is on top of the mountain on the picture above) The elevation of Blue Slide Lookout is 6785 feet above sea level. It was an over 500 foot in elevation climb up through the soft dirt to get up there. I didn't air down so my tires were digging into the deep powder most of the way up. At times, the cloud of dust was going up the mountain faster than we were.
On top, we ran SF1020 to Trail 613. Once on Trail 613 the woods got thick and the trail got tight. The first part was mostly down hill. We stop on the way down so we could get some pictures.
Eastwood was my co-pilot in the Molly Mule
Down at the bottom of the mountain we took a break. This is the point where the Grey Rock Trail meets Trail 613.
After the break we headed on up Trail 613. The trail followed Divide Ridge where the views are great. On one side you can see the Rimrock area and on the other you can see the Yakima Valleys. When we got to Strobach Mountain we took a quick look down at Rimrock. It was cold and getting close to dark so we headed off Divide Ridge by going down C1000. On the way down the mountain we seen lights all over the valley light up. We got back to the cabin a little after dark. At the cabin the other half of the group had some stories to tell us about a lost CJ, a lost boy and Gary and the Big Foot people. We won’t go into those stories!