Saturday, October 11th, 2014
Total Miles: 230

My Cousin Jamie and her family live just north of Salt Lake in Syracuse, UT.  We had limited time so we decided to trailer our bike out to their home.  It was the perfect place to leave the truck and trailer while we enjoyed the ride plus it is always nice to catch up with family.  Since we had family in Syracuse and we were adding California to our trip we decided to run the Utah Back Country Discover Route from North to South.

On day one Jamie made a fantastic breakfast to start the day.  We are so grateful for all the hospitality.  We finished packing the bike took some photos and headed out.

We took blacktop East out of Ogden up a beautiful canyon which took us pass Snow Basin.  We joined up with the Utah Back Country Discovery Route just before Evanston, WY.  It was 44 degrees in the canyon.  We stopped in Evanston for a beer and a burger at Suds Brothers Brewery and headed South.  Outside of Evanston the road turned to dirt and we had a great stretch of off road.  Road conditions were fantastic.   We passed the Corner Monument which marks the Southwest corner of Wyoming.

Galen aired down the tires.  We had a couple short technical rocky uphill sections which got us both back in the groove of riding off road.  Keep in mind the bike is loaded very heavy and the front end got light a couple times and wanted to life up on some of the steep uphill spots.  Galen put all his weight forward to keep the front end down.  Tip: Ladies, when you see this situation it helps to lean as far forward without hitting your driver.

Fall leaves were amazing.  The yellows and oranges were crazy vivid in the afternoon sun.  The Back Country Discovery Routes offers areas that are orange alternate routes which are a bit more technical.  After a short discussion we skipped the alternate routes and stayed on the main yellow route.  Galen was less than happy with this decision.  Yes, I am sure we could have made it through the orange routes but I wanted day 1 to be smooth with no drops and no injuries.

Our stop off at Mirror Lake was gorgeous.

We also stopped at Washington Lake.  It was 3pm and too early to setup Camp for the night.  Temperatures continued to drop it was about 48 degrees when we left Washington Lake.  Fantastic ride this afternoon.  Passed a number of hunters.  We hit Haden pass at roughly 10,000 ft and Bald Mt pass at roughly 11,000 ft.  We dropped into the Uinta National Forest.  It was easy gravel roads which allowed Galen up shift to a higher gear and make some miles.

As temps kept dropping and we were losing daylight Galen decided we would bailout and find a hotel room for the night.  A cold front was moving in and we were losing daylight fast.  We bailed out at Highway 40 at Currant Creek.  We knew there would be hotel options in Heber City but we were pleasantly surprised when just 10 minutes down the road we came to Daniels Summit Lodge.  Turned out to be a great stop over.  $110 a night including taxes.  The Lodge had a restaurant and hot tub on site.  We split the chicken fried steak dinner which warmed us right up.  They had Cutthroat Pale Ale from Uinta Brewing Company on draft to wash it all down.  A soak in the hot tub with a night cap of Whiskey and I was ready for bed.

Continuous colors and abundant sunshine made the day fantastic.