No Snow

Posted: December 11, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

Okay, there was a little bit of snow and some ice. Actually, lots of ice. I’ve been waiting for a good dump of snow to be able to go play in a foot of snow, but it hasn’t come. I haven’t waxed my skis and I have yet to get out the snowblower and prep it for the season.

On the road in, it’s back down to pavement. But beware, the bathrooms are locked. They should be open as long as users can easily drive in to the staging area.

The first climb out of the staging area was ice covered but a simple enough climb. I didn’t bother airing down because I was only doing a short trip in to Miller Lake.

Pooling water was frozen over in some places, not in others.

As I said, ice.

Here’s where it got interesting. Just before the end of the trail you see below, in the shade, the TJ slipped a few times. It actually got a little sideways. Locked the rear, locked the front, shifted to the side to get off the ice and on the rocks. No problem.

Here’s a picture coming back out. Lowest gear, very slowly.

I had my nephew with me from Oregon, so we played tourist, took 89 around Emerald Bay, 50 over to Carson City and drove up to Virginia City from the Dayton side. Call us tourists, parked in front of the Bucket of Blood Saloon.

If the snow ever comes, remember, there is ice underneath. Although there is no snow in the foreseeable future, it will come. If you go out, be prepared to spend the night in below freezing temperatures.

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Rubicon Ronin

Good News, Bad News

Posted: June 4, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

The good news is that the gate on Forest Road 03 has been opened. That’s the first gate off Highway 89 going up Blackwood Canyon. The gate was supposed to be opened on the 1st but was not. I’m not sure when it opened.

The bad news is that the gate on our OHV trail 15N38, the Middle Fork Trail, is still closed. This gate should have been opened for use of the trail on June 1st.

So, change of plans, I headed out to the Rubicon in search of another side trail. I headed up the Buck Lake Trail, 14N40. It’s not an overly difficult trail except for one short, but steep, section.

I wasn’t the first, but I was the first since a significant snow melt.

There was one tree across the Trail. Now you see it…

Now you don’t…

I did drop into the Buck Lake campground area. There are a few trees down blocking the campground. Sorry, but I didn’t take the time to clear them.

Here’s the difficult section. There is a winch post installed above this section because it is that difficult.

Have I mentioned the great views from this trail?

Here’s where my travels ended today. I tried it slow. I tried it fast. But I kept getting pushed off to the right. I could have winched through it but I figured someone was trying to tell me to turn around. I imagine there are more snow drifts along the Ellis trails.

With that snow drift shortening my day, I decided to drive home through South Lake Tahoe and stop at the Forest Service office and ask why the Middle Fork Trail is closed.

Maybe another day.

I did send an email on Monday asking about the gates still closed after their opening dates. I will send out another tonight.

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Rubicon Ronin

Side Trail Conditions…

Posted: June 2, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , | Leave a comment

I was asked about side trails: Buck Lake, Richardson Lake (Sourdough Hill), Ellis, etc. I have not personally been out on those yet.

The people I referred to in the last post about locals getting out in the side-by-sides and clearing trees said they had been on and had “cleared” all of the side trails. Sourdough will have one or two sections with nasty side hills. They said Buck does have a very side hill section before the rocky climb just above the lake. Ellis always has snow later in the season.

Some of the “clearing” they had done was before the last big snow melt. That melt exposed tress we cleared out yesterday. Who knows what’s out there. This time of year you should carry a saw , of some kind, and be prepared to winch trees out of the way.

“Turn Around, Don’t Go Around!”

They were in a well-built set of side-by-sides. I would expect that a street legal rig would have a much more difficult time traversing the snow, especially a side hill snow drift.

The snow will melt very fast. Two weeks will make a HUGE difference.

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Rubicon Ronin

There’s Still Snow!

Posted: June 1, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

The plan was to go in through Blackwood Canyon and up the Middle Fork Trail (15N38) and clear trees to the summit. If we had time, we were going to head down the Red Cabin Trail (upper hobbit/Barker Meadow OHV Trail, 16E79) and then down the actual Hobbit Trail (16E76).

Well, the gate at the bottom of Forest Service Road 03 was still locked. Long story for later. So, we headed over to the Rubicon to go around the back way.

When we got to the intersection of the Rubicon and Forest Road 03-04, we took 03-04 toward Barker Pass. It wasn’t too long before we found trees that needed attention. This is actually the third tree we removed. The first was on the Rubicon and people had stacked rocks to get over it!

Some were so rotten, we just pulled them to the side. So many times I forgot to get out the camera.

This one took some rigging for the winch to be able to pull it to the side.

As we got around the north side of Ellis Peak, the snow became deeper. The snow wheeling was actually pretty fun. The snow kept traction as long as you were going stupid slow.

We made it past Bear Lake but the northern aspect protected the snow and it was becoming quite a side hill.

Here is the guy in front of me dropping down the last hill we went down.

We finally came to a downhill section we decided we didn’t want to crawl back up. We turned around and headed home. The side hill was pretty steep right here but it doesn’t show.

We never made it over to any of the three trails we were trying to get to. I will be looking into the situation with the locked gates.

On the way out, We stopped at the Rubicon intersection and met two side-by-sides going out 03-04. They were locals who had been clearing trees on a bunch of side trails for the last three weeks! Awesome.

I need to thank Stan and John for hanging out today. Always safer with others. Maybe we’ll get out next week and clear more trails.

.

Rubicon Ronin

Another Beautiful Snow Run

Posted: May 17, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

May 17, 2025. 43 degrees. Overcast. 9am start. Seven rigs. Awesome day!

The climb out of staging is clear.

There is still a ton of water on the trail. If you go, please Tread Lightly! and stay on the trail.

As you climb, you will find lots of snow. It will be around for probably two or three weeks. Memorial weekend will probably be chaos with too many people trying to get out. We were out at 9am and half the group turned around at 1pm. The first rig we saw was at 1:30 on our way out.

The snow drifts and the way they melt shifted us to the side of the trail a number of times. Many off camber sections.

We did cut a few trees from the trail. We drove over a few that we didn’t have time to deal with.

I failed to take a picture of the largest tree we cut and winched off the trail. Carry a saw as there will be more trees to deal with as the snow melts and there was at least one widow maker that could come down at any time.

We got to the Arizona (concrete) crossing just west of the Ellis Peak Trail at the pond. The group split here and three rig continued on for another hour of so; the other four of us turned back.

Here is as far as most of the group got. If you’re wondering, that’s “Space Junk”. It’s got a front wheel drive engine mounted sideways, no transfer case, no low range and works really well. He did make it up the ledge, as did many of us, but most turned around as we were done.

Here is the pond on the way out. Really slushy snow driving out in the afternoon.

No real issues on the trip. Yes, a few people needed a strap. At the end of the day, I realized I had forgotten to reload my air hoses. Oops. Thankfully, I was with friends who shared theirs with me.

And the bathrooms at staging had been opened, cleaned and stocked.

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Rubicon Ronin

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