Storeyburn/ Gales Creek Loop

When Sunday morning came around, I pulled the Batmobile (aka my bike) out from the garage, lubed the chain, aligned the brake calipers, leveled off my shocks and pumped up my tires. The Batmobile was now ready for action. I just hoped that Batman had the legs for what was in store for the days ride. I decided that the figure would need to wait for another weekend since my legs were tired and for the simple fact that I had never been on the Storey Burn trail and didn’t know what I was getting myself into. I knew the trail would have lots of climbing and that the trail conditions were probably going to be pretty muddy so in the end an exploratory mission ended up being the best plan of attack for the day.  

Gales Creek CG is closed and gated for the winter so the early season TH becomes the gated pullout off Hwy 6 just about a mile up from the campground. When I got there, the default Th was pretty much full (outdoorsy ppl love to go out on Super Bowl Sunday when the trails are mostly devoid of human contact). The only people I saw all day were at the trailhead J. The ride was pretty uneventful for the most part so Ill spare you the borrowing details. In summary, the climbs were hard for my tired legs and the trail was mostly good except for descending down Gales Creek trail from summit of Hwy 6, it got really muddy and slick, resulting in two pretty good falls for myself.  Another thing to note is that there is now another trail up at the TH for Storey Burns called Sickter Lars. (It is not listed on my adventuremaps.com map of NW Oregon, maybe the new one has it?) This is a short, expert only, all mountain/downhill trail. Yes, I gave it a whirl and had to dismount many times so it’s not worth repeating, but it is good to see that new, properly marked, legal trails are being built in the area. I finished the ride in roughly 2.5 hours and cruise back home to watch the Super Bowl and took part in a self-afflicted food coma.


UNT


Bryan