This morning we drove up to the West Fork National Forest Access Road. We drove the 10 miles or so into the forest along the West Fork river. The drive is very pretty. The road dead ends at a trailhead and the 5 or so parking spots were already taken. We drove the 1/10 mile back to “overflow” parking that was empty. We made our own trail through the wood the 300-400 yard to the river. Surprisingly, we didn’t see or hear anyone on our short hike or at the river. The river is really nice with towering cliffs rising above us.
This drive was pretty short and enjoying the river didn’t take that long. Leaving West Fork we decided to try and find Silver Falls. The Falls were shown on the sign near the East Fork campground to be only 8 miles. Sounds easy right? We hadn’t gone ½ mile past the campground before the road turned bad. We could only go 5-10 mph due to the very rough rock road. About a mile in there was a sign warning that High Clearance Vehicles were recommended. The drive was very pretty but it was hard to enjoy due to the poor driving/riding conditions. The road followed a very pretty river and we were shocked to see some nice Class A’s and other RV’s parked at an unmarked dry campground probably about 3 miles in. I wasn’t smart enough to take note of the mileage when we saw the orignal sign. We drove what seemed like a really long distance before giving up due to the road conditions. A high clearance vehicle like our Jeep really did take some of the stress out of the drive. Even with our clearance we hit a rock ledge pretty hard on our skid plate. Later when I reviewed a map online I figured we had traveled 5 or 6 miles of the 8 mile drive.
It was 2pm by the time we made all the way back to town and we decided to repeat lunch at the Roadhouse Grill. It was really good again. After lunch we got gas and washed the car, it really needed a wash. We relaxed around the coach and made a few preparations for the travel day tomorrow.