Washington to Meadow Lake

Talk about Trails. Got a good one? We want to know!

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traildad
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Washington to Meadow Lake

Postby traildad » Sun Jul 08, 2007 1:12 am

I got to go back to Meadow Lake today. I decided to ride from Washington instead of starting near Lake Bowman. The town of Washington is only 5 easy miles from highway 20 and was a little over 2 hours from my house. It took us about 45 min to get to Lake Bowman. The first 10 miles or so is a nice maintained road. I would prefer do that 45 min on my quad rather than pulling it on the trailer. I am guessing that from my house we got to Lake Bowman faster than if we had driven up Bowman Rd. and started riding at the weather station. It is about 26 miles to Meadow Lake. There is the River Rest Resort on the South Yuba river. They claim you can ride from camp thru Washington onto the forest road. We decided to park where Gaston road starts. There is a nice wide spot and the road is fairly busy so no one should get any ideas about messing with your vehicles. All in all a nice ride.

This link is for a Magellan Mapsend track from Meadow Lake to where we parked.
http://us.f13.yahoofs.com/bc/43e02bbdm9 ... GBh4vqtYnz

Image
Last edited by traildad on Mon May 26, 2008 2:43 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Ken
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Postby Ken » Sun Jul 08, 2007 1:58 pm

Very nice ride....
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hemingray
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Postby hemingray » Mon Jul 09, 2007 1:21 pm

Yeah, driving Bowman Rd. from 20 sucks. We've parked a couple of times right where the pavement ends and ridden from there.

But I, too, like Gaston Rd - even just for using the pickup to get to the Bowman area. One day I drove up Gaston Rd to Meadow Lake Rd and then to the junction of the 41 road and parked there.

If you're coming up Gaston and you're not needing to blast on over to Bowman, you can take the 50 road (a.k.a. Hoosier Rd. - a right turn off from Gaston Rd., as you're heading up from the Yuba River - near the Gaston townsite) for a nice and not too long detour around Celina Ridge. It rejoins Meadow Lake road just below where the 41 road (Pinoli Rd.) meets Meadow Lake Rd. near the ridge above Bowman. The area is vigorously signed as No Trespassing, but it's an NF road - many of the stubs aren't tho.

As a matter of fact, the 41 road is a great alternative to going around Bowman and is terribly scenic as well. But it definitely takes longer! (the lower part - down to Weaver Lake and past East Fork Creek is pretty bumpy. But when you start to climb Pinoli Peak, there's some pretty fast running uphill). At the saddle where the Sierra Buttes come into view, there is a side road on the right (south) that goes a short distance to a log landing (smoothest I've ever seen) that has a short walk to a really nice rock outcropping that has a view of both the Yuba canyon to the west and the Weaver Lake/East Fork Creek drainage below, as well as everything above Bowman. The views from Pinoli Ridge are definitely worth the price of admission too. Once down the ridge, turn right on the 76 road, which takes you down to the "T" to either Meadow Lake or back to Bowman lakeshore.

I haven't ridden a lot, but has become one of my favorite areas.

-Dave
Wherever I go, there I am

Paynes Creek 2016!

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Postby clampnpolaris » Mon Jul 09, 2007 6:48 pm

staying at river rest resort the 22nd to the 26
planning on doing alot of riding
anyone want to join us
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