Hey Hey team!
Thanks for the amazing trip! Tl;dr at the end, but uhh... have this mel-going-home-trip-report!
I elected to leave the Bear River Range by way of the German Dugway road.
I was strongly advised against doing this! I would have had a more efficient and less expensive weekend if I had heeded this sound advice lol. The attached map listed the road as passable by vehicle so I decided to go for it.
Spoiler alert: the road goes but uhh you won't like driving it.
See the attached photo for the color references to follow. The recommended route to our weekend camp is highlighted in green. I departed camp along road 408 (marked in blue) by way of Paris Ice Cave. (I stopped off at the ice cave...I'd call it a shelter lol. The moss was so pretty in there!) Roads marked in blue were quality roads that I expect most cars could manage.
Past the Paris Ice Cave I came to the junction of 408 and 1054. The section of 408 marked in orange had signage reading "Extremely Rough Roads, Passenger Vehicles not recommended" and so I wisely* continued along the right fork up road 1054. Immediately following the fork the road quality shifted to extremely rocky but manageable. As I approached the summit the overconfidence in the road was starting to seep into my soul...heh.
Upon reaching the summit I found I had a bar of LTE and was able to let Ryan know which path I was on, where I was headed, and gave a call out time (ok so, the manageable road was...spicy but not horrific... spicy enough to merit giving a call out time).
Looking at both my map and the road ahead I more or less knew this was my point of no return. I could turn back now and head out through Paris or I could roll on out through mink creek. With all the confidence of a single bar of LTE, I elected to begin the steep journey through the switchbacks coming down the summit.
I quickly determined that was the wrong choice, but uhh see previous "point of no return". There was no way for my car to make it back up this hill...and definitely no opportunity to turn around. I continued down the rocky and rutted out road largely allowing the road to steer my car, gardening where possible and necessary. There were times additional gardening would have been helpful... but uhh the slope was too much to leave the vehicle heh. The stair stepping rocks had drops up to 18" and the deepest rut I measured was 54" deep. Strattling the rut coming around the 3 hairpin turns on the switchbacks was definitely not preferred but also made me feel pretty damn powerful. Lots of tipping, lots of strattling, fair bit of rock fun. I did tip far enough to have a mirror folded in so that was neat! Coming down the final stretch of road 1054 I knew I was less than a quarter mile out from 407 and felt confident it would be more passable/higher traveled.
Annnnnd right at the final few feet of 1054 my strattling deep ruts was paired with superbly inconvenient boulders on either side of the path. I took a sidewall hit to the passenger side but was able to slide out and believed myself home free! Got out for a quick visual inspection and all appeared initially well. Once I was on the 407 it was easy peasy and popped on to the road in mink creek.
As soon as I gained speed about 45mph my car began pulling to the right (curses) and I pulled off hw 36 to discover I had indeed punctured the sidewall of my front right tire. Most likely as I gained speed the rubber was able to rub against itself, heat up, and tore. Well shit. I backed into a nearby field with a downed gate and started jacking up my tire. As I took off my tire I discovered that two studs on the side of sidewall tear were shorn and no longer functional. Whoopie! I tossed on the spare tire with only 3 lugnuts, leaving 2 empty side by side heh. An exceptionally kind stranger stopped and walked over and started helping me put stuff away when we noticed my rear tire losing air. YAY. He mentioned he knew a guy with a mobile compressor and said he'd be right back. He rolls back in with a second guy who brought compressor and an impact driver to see if we could lock a nut on to at least one of the broken studs (no dice). As I had only 3 lugs and a slow leak in another tire they advised I limp in to logan to find an open tire shop. While heading to Pocatello would have been on my way there is no service or places to stop if I lost a tire. I thanked them for their help and asked how to repay them--they requested I only pay it forward. Oh! Also they were extremely impressed I was able to drive the German Dugway road, I pointed out I obviously wasn't successful lol. Their take was I was more successful than they would have expected . They told me it is commonly known in the area that the 1054 is for dirtbikes and snowmobiles.
I planned to drive into Preston to hit up the o'reilly's for some supplies to hopefully help my lack-of-attached-front-tire-situation. As I got into service I received a call from an unknown number. Turns out the kind stranger who pulled over to help me was able to get ahold of the owner of the tire shop in preston to ask if someone could callout and open the shop for me. What?!? So I went and met Jake at the tire shop, bought a new set of tires, walked over to o'reilly's and bought a couple of studs, and hung out while he kindly replaced my studs (have never seen a tire shop offer that...thanks Jake) and got me set up with new tires. I was back on the road at 12:22!! Pretty wild and a little unbelievable how well it worked out. I felt exceptionally grateful for all kindness and lucky breaks I received as I absolutely built that pyre for myself!
*NOT WISE. Just turn around then, past Mel, dammit!!!!
TL;DR Listen to Matt, don't try to cross the Bear River Range from Paris to Mink Creek in a passenger vehicle, People in small towns in Idaho are hella nice.
Happy, safe trails my friends! Until next adventure
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