Bikers & Lakes

July 20

The day began early with eggs, bacon and final planning for this morning’s hike. We decided on the Boulder Lakes trail, which gets positive reviews on my iPhone hiking app, AllTrails, whose users nonetheless warn that it’s crowded and that:

• “It’s pretty much an uphill climb for about 1.5 miles!”
• “The 11 mile drive to the trailhead can be pretty bouncy with a few large potholes, even in an SUV. Some folks driving it are kinda crazy- it’s a tight road with a lot of blind curves…”

Still, it seemed like a good option. In the Trinity Alps, every route involves elevation gain and funky access roads.

As we were getting organized to go, the silence was shattered by the roar of an approaching biker-gang-type motorcycle that had no muffler. We could hear him all the way out at the highway, over a mile away, as he rolled toward us along the dusty, pitted one-lane road. Pausing in front of our sites, the unsmiling rider glanced at us appraisingly without a greeting before roaring on through the trees toward the back of the campground 1/4 mile down through the trees to the dead-end.

There was something sinister about his demeanor that set off my worry alarm. We saw that he wasn’t a camper since he had no gear, so the reason for his presence in this remote spot was an uneasy mystery. While I love the solitude, I am also aware of our vulnerability here off the beaten path and many miles out of cellphone range. In state and national park campgrounds, isolation is not an issue, since those places are populated and well monitored. But in national forests, it’s a different matter entirely.

An hour later, when we left for our hike, Biker Dude still hadn’t reappeared. 

Our destination was a 45-minute drive up Highway 3 to a skinny, potholed, steep dirt road that wound eleven miles to the Boulder Lake trailhead.

AllTrails, tracking our progress, kept dinging to alert us that we’d gone off-trail, which we were pretty sure we hadn’t. Along the way, that old stabbing in my lower-left side started up, hindering my progress and compromising my attitude. I didn’t want to mention it to Nick because I was determined to continue on. After all, the whole point of this trip is to get into the backcountry. But when he suggested the tiniest detour up to a clump of purple flowers growing in the rocks near the lake, I declined and explained why. He worried about me for the rest of the outing, so I resolved not to utter another word about it in the coming days.

We reached Boulder Lake without a problem except for tired legs and breathlessness.

After resting for lunch, we got curious about a mile-plus spur-trip to Little Boulder Lake. Off we went, and encountered nary a soul.

As we admired the view, we heard a loud crack and a crash. If a tree falls in the woods and someone is there to hear it, it is very loud.

On the way back down we had a clear view of Mt. Shasta, in the past heavily snow-covered all year and now bone-dry.

Over file miles later, we were back at the car. This is where we walked, according to AllTrails:

On our late-afternoon drive back, we stopped at the KOA “Kampground” store for dark chocolate Dove ice cream bars. Needless to say, globs of brown goo dripped all over my pants and onto the passenger seat of Nick’s new car. 

Returning to camp, we soon realized the biker was still squirreled away somewhere in the back of the campground not far from the pit toilets. There’s nothing to do back there—no trailheads or other diversions—so his continued presence confounded me. He made himself known by periodically starting up his hog and revving its engine at the top of its mechanical lungs. I wasn’t about to make the trek in that direction for a pee-break lest I cross his path. (The nearby bushes are perfectly suitable for that purpose anyway.)

Instead, I slid down the little embankment behind our site and, tossing aside clothes, immersed myself in a hidden section of the cold creek, rinsing camp-grime and chocolate from myself and my pants while hoping Cycle Creep didn’t find his way down there. He didn’t, and I was refreshed.

Finally, at dusk, we heard the bike engine wail as its grim rider broke through the trees and passed us, again without as much as a nod, rumbling off in the direction of the highway. What a relief. Good riddance. Once again, we had the campground to ourselves.

After dinner we played a game each of Sorry and Battleship (game score now 3-1 in favor of Nick) before retiring, physically depleted, to our tents. 

I don’t know what it is about people and their lack of mufflers up here, but minutes later a similarly ill-equipped 4×4 truck rumbled its way down the dark road, hesitated to observe our sites, and rattled slowly off toward the other five units at the back. Ten minutes later it re-emerged and its occupant proceeded to set up camp at the funky little site directly across from us. Why, when there are better sites and all with privacy, would they take this one? It was 11:30 before they cut their engine and stopped banging around for the night.