For the last week or so, I've had the itch. That's because - for the last couple of weeks - a family vacation to the Mt. Shasta area in California has kept us occupied and off the trail. Not that I'm complaining - we were duly pampered with fabulous food and plush accommodations - but once we got back, it seemed like a good idea to get out a little bit. @mrs.turbodb wasn't quite so enthusiastic as I was, but when she learned that it was u-pick peach season, she quickly changed her tune - if only for a single…
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Having had my week-long trip to Idaho's Sawtooth Mountains cut short by smoke, I wasn't really sure what to do with myself. Then, I realized that the answer was in my own backyard - or at least nearby! We've been lucky so far this year to not have a ton of smoke in Western Washington, so what better place to go hang out than the forests around Mt. Rainier. Great weather and clear skies would make it the perfect place to just go hang out and enjoy the outdoors!
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It's been over a year since I was last in Idaho, and boy did I miss it! So, after spending a few weeks at home upon returning from the New Mexico Backcountry Discovery Route (NMBDR), and with @mrs.turbodb heading out on a camping trip with her dad, late July seemed like the perfect time for me to whip up a little something in the Sawtooths. The key word there being "seemed." I'd been collecting places to go - some of them from roads not travelled on earlier trips, others discovered online one way or the other, and one in particular…
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Having spent the last six days on the New Mexico Backcountry Discovery Route (NMBDR), there were a few things that needed our attention before we knew exactly what our next move would be. Pulled over where the last of the dirt hit CO-17, we each had one bar of LTE service and we set to work. I made a quick call to Alcan Spring - in Grand Junction, CO - to check in with Lew, the new owner. Having very much liked my first set of leaf springs, I'd ordered my second set several weeks earlier. Before leaving on the…
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After doing the same thing annually - for five years running - it's probably safe to call it a tradition. Backcountry Discover Routes (BDRs) have become that for us. Oregon got us hooked, and after adding Washington, Idaho, and Nevada over the last several summers, this year we decided that we'd make a run at New Mexico. Weaving our way more than 1,200 miles back and forth across the Continental Divide, our elevation varying from 3500- to 11,000-feet, and with temperatures predicted to be 100°F (or higher) for much of our journey, we knew it was going to be quite…
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I was naive. I thought that returning to Cedar Mesa in search of more Native American Ruins (see Utah, Re-Ruined) would get me to the point where I'd have seen most of what we'd missed on our first trip to the area some two years earlier (see Ruining Around Utah). Yeah, calling that naive is probably being generous. While I was there, I quickly realized that I was only scratching the surface - that there was so much more in the area - that I could probably visit for years (decades even), and still have more to see. A lot like…
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The Owyhee Canyonlands - the little known Grand Canyon of Oregon - have miles and miles of roads to explore, and solitude to enjoy. Located in the southeast corner of the state and spilling into Idaho, the Owyhee River runs north-to-south through the vast landscape. Having previously limited our explorations to the east side of the river, we decided it was finally time to venture across the water and see what we could find along the west bank!
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Burning Man. I've never been and don't really ever feel like I will have the need to go, but the location - a big flat playa in the middle of a bunch of wilderness - has always intrigued me. Then, while I was researching side trips for our trip along the Nevada Backcountry Discovery Route (NVBDR) last year, I stumbled upon a few photos of High Rock Canyon, just north of the Black Rock Desert - wow! The desert turned out to be too far from the NVBDR for us to make the trip at the time, but ever since…
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We had unfinished business in Utah, after our Ruining Around Utah trip back in spring of 2019. An unseasonably wet winter meant that the higher elevation roads were still impassable due to snow, so one of our primary goals - the Lewis Lodge ruins - remained just out of reach. And I haven't gotten back since. I'd had so much fun on that trip - searching for Native American ruins - that I decided it was time to go back. This time, the plan centered almost entirely around ruins - Lewis Lodge, Hotel Rock, Moon House, River House, Jailhouse, and…
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I've visited the Owyhee region of Oregon several times, each time discovering something new, something special. The region, located in southeast corner of the state, seems to be an empty wasteland - and nothing could be farther from the truth. Surely, it is remote, and from any single spot the landscape can seem monotonous - but all it takes is a little looking to find the gems hidden in plain sight. With a few days to explore, I decided it was time to look for remote areas I'd never before visited. Stringing together a series of roads that I hoped…
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When my buddy Ben asked if I wanted to go to the Island District of Canyonlands National Park in order to run the White Rim Trail, I was pretty pumped. While I've been to the other districts - The Maze and The Needles - I've never been to The Island in the Sky, and have always heard about how beautiful it is; some even describe it as the Crown Jewel of the park. With a plan to meet in Moab on a Thursday just after lunch, I set out on the long drive south Wednesday. My plan was to arrive…
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Smack in the middle of winter, we found ourselves with a little extra time and nothing planned to fill the days. That, in addition to the fact that it was going to be cold and snowy in nearly all of Washington state, signaled to us that an escape down south would be a doubly worthwhile endeavor. The question was: where should we go? We'd been to both Death Valley (Nadeau Trail, Loose Ends), the Mojave Preserve (Short Days), and Owens Valley (Tragedies, Right Back to Owens Valley) a couple times in the last couple months - and while another trip…
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I'd been home less than a week after Tragedies in the Tablelands, and I still had the itch to get out and see everything I'd planned before things went all wonky. Even as we'd been driving home from that trip, I was ordering a new camera and lenses, and I was already checking the weather forecast to see how long it would be until snow rendered the area impassable for the remainder of winter. The good news was that the camera equipment showed up in a few days. The bad news was that there were only a few more before…
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Having recently visited the Volcanic Tablelands for the first time in search of and petroglyphs, we'd been delighted with what we'd found. So delighted - in fact - that I started researching the area for a return trip as soon as we got home! As I searched, I realized we could spend several days in the area, wandering. Several additional petroglyph sites, old mines, and views - of the Sierra Mountains to the west and the White Mountains to the east - would fill our days. That sounded great to us. Unfortunately, things had a way of working themselves out…
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Visiting the Mojave National Preserve has - unconsciously - become a traditional "last trip of the year." For three years now, the pull of the desert sun has drawn us south - out of the gloomy grey of the Pacific Northwest. This year the trip would center around foot travel - something that had been uncharacteristically difficult on our last visit - allowing us to immerse ourselves in our surroundings. Over the course of a week - at the end of this most unusual year - we'd take advantage of every moment of daylight to discover the solitude, history, and…
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I don't know whether it's an "oh, duh!" moment, or "can you believe it?" situation, but less than two weeks after returning from our Death Valley trip along the Nadeau Trail, we were headed back for more! I was jazzed, and - a little surprisingly to me - so was @mrs.turbodb! This time, the land area we'd cover would be larger than the last, with our plan to see several places that we've meant to visit over the last few years but that we've never gotten to - largely because there's only so much you can see on a given…
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The Nadeau Trail follows the west side of Panamint Valley, roughly in a north-south direction between the Argus Range and the valley's paved roads. Measuring a scant 27 miles long - and for the most part completely straight - the casual observer may wonder if allotting three days to travel this road is two-and-a-half days longer than necessary... I can assure you that it is not. Colorful side canyons, historic mine sites, glorious overlooks, and mysterious geological formations easily filled our days to the brim. And the icing on the cake? A hunt for, and ultimately discovery of, petroglyphs -…
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There wasn't much of a question in any of our minds as to where our two week trip was going to take place for 2020. After our setback the previous year - see Exploring Colorado Becomes Redhead Down - much of the winter had been spent getting the Redhead ready to hit the trail. A few smaller excursions to iron out the wrinkles after all the work, and we were ready to go. Colorado was calling. We wouldn't know if we were really ready until the end.
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How could it be that we hadn’t explored this area? I have no idea, really. Most likely, it's simply a side effect of the total lack of exploration we've done in our home state of Washington - opting instead to explore areas in other surrounding states, where weather is consistently warmer, or at least drier. But, what could be viewed as an oversight, we viewed as opportunity. With dirt roads less than three hours from home, we didn't have to rush out in the dark of early morning - instead, we got a leisurely start around 9:30am, and made it…
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Summer is a great time in the state of Washington. While much of the rest of the year might be dreary and gray, the long days and clear air between mid-July and September are nothing short of perfection for getting out to enjoy the mountainous terrain in the western part of the state. And this time, we were headed as far west as we could go - all the way to the Olympic Peninsula, for an epic hike along one of the highest ridges around.
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