Yesterday I drove back over Galena Summit down to Stanley. I joined Cameron and Greg. Plan is to drive to Iron Creek and find a primitive camp spot. We scored the closest to the highway. They put a big dent in a case of PBR then went to bed. Today wake up is 7:00, pack, then drive into Stanley to the Bakery for a sustaining bfast for the ride ahead. Rockman, we shuttled from Little Casino TH putting 2 bikes on the roof rack and my wheelless bike in the back of his Outback. We drove up Boundary creek to the TH. The trail started out right up, I had no warm up. I hike a biked a good bit of the almost 2,000′ climb on loose decomposed granite (shit for pedaling). I never got my breathing to work. Hence the blog title. Boundary joined Little Casino that would take us back to my van parked on the Salmon river.
Killer view of Redfish Lake and back to where I back packed last week:
Loose dirt was challenging to ride over. It was 2.5 miles up then 9.5 miles along Little Casino. The middle section of the trail had been this summer rerouted on a newly built trail. The layout was OK bu the construction missed creating an outslope or proper grade changes to spill the h2o off the trail.
Loose decomposed granite.
We made it down to the van unscathed. We piled into my van then I drove us back to Boundary creek TH. They went back to town, I drove back down to redfish lake and took a shower. I drove back to Ketchum later.
Still in the upper 80s here but chills off nicely. Fridge struggles still w/ high temp.
I shuffle out of Woods river Valley tomorrow after almost 5 weeks.
Sweet. That’s a grind of a climb but what a payoff. Hopefully most of the downed trees on L. Casino had been cut out?