After spending what felt like way too much time looking at three different potential campsite locations in the Fish Lake National Forest around the mountains of Central Utah, after already driving three hours from the Moab area, I finally settled for the one I had first checked out, almost feeling like an idiot for not having just stayed there to begin with.
Arriving for good this time at 8pm, with only a wee bit of light left, I just laughed knowing if I had begun to set up camp when I first arrived instead of visiting the other two creeks I wanted to check out, I would have been fully setup and ready to make dinner by 5pm and would have had a much more relaxing evening! Only about a half mile from the Interstate, but quite in the middle of nowhere, far from any civilization and cell service, my new campsite sat right on Red Creek in the trees with beautiful views up the canyon, and a fire ring stocked with enough firewood for the night, all ready to go.
This fairly wide, beautiful, sage-covered canyon valley dotted with junipers, cottonwoods and aspen along the creek, and a few pines scattered about also served as a popular trade route, the ‘Old Spanish Trail’, and the section where the traders walked along Red Creek was a popular shortcut along that trail, called the Fish Lake Cuttoff, which cut 70 miles off the main route, if I remember reading the historical marker sign correctly. Kinda cool to have stumbled upon such a widely used historical trail without even knowing about it.
Also, the canyon wall directly across the road from my site is a pretty nice view, with its massive rock formations mixed with trees...
However I was not content to commit to staying here so close to the Interstate without first exploring further up the road. After all, Red Creek is indeed red, being extremely muddy, and I had noticed on a late moonlight walk last night that another creek feeding into
It - North Creek - was pretty clear, and thought maybe I could find an even more ideal spot next to that source of purer water. Also, I could still barely hear the trucks going down the highway all morning, as they occasionally drove by.
So after breakfast, I set off up the road to do some exploring, and after having no luck finding a more ideal place at the first several potential sites I had seen on the map, the last road I drove down had just what I was looking for. A little more remote and secluded, right next to the clear running creek, great views, accessible in my Subaru, plenty of trees for shade and wind protection, accessible firewood supply, and still in the beautiful sagebrush elevation of the valley before turning to full on high elevation forest. And I had views of the snow-covered peaks obscured by the lower ridges at my current camp, so beautiful and remote.
I was stoked, my exploring had paid off! I don’t think I will have ever found such a remote, secluded, peaceful and quiet location to camp at that is accessible by car. As it is, it does not look like this area gets much traffic at all, let alone down the side roads such as this one. Once I get all moved over there, I will be camping along the main Old Spanish Trail, too, as the monument at the road junction informed me. Pretty cool to think that thousands of people back in the day hiked through here, and probably spent their nights camped at these very sites.
Instead of immediately packing up and making the transition today, I decided instead to stay one more night where I’m at, taking full advantage of the quicker access to the highway and make a run into Richfield (the county seat and only town with major services anywhere around this rural part of the state), and see if I could find a bike repair shop as my mountain bike has broken down on me, and Dakota’s not too happy with no mountain biking the past two weeks!
Despite no bicycle repair shops listed online, the friendly gals at the sports and outdoors shop pointed me in the right direction, to the one place in town that sells and services mountain bikes, who are not listed anywhere online. I was ecstatic to say the least, to discover they had all the parts in stock that I needed (mainly a shifter - no gears on a mountain bike isn’t much fun), and would be able to fix my broken chain. Not stoked about the cost, but they’ll have it done in two days tops, and Dakota will be thrilled. I, too, will be happy to be able to ride again, especially considering the number of awesome trail rides there look to be in this area, between the non motorized trails, network of roads, and 4-wheeler trails.
These forest roads go all the way through miles of the forest to the far southern tip, and eventually connect with the large Fish Lake many miles to the south, the namesake of this particular national forest, and past which the Old Spanish Trail ran back in the 1800s. Definitely a cool little area to explore, with plenty of remote campsites to choose from and endless 4-wheeling and mountain biking opportunities far from civilization.
Now after my successful run into town, I must return back to the wild, finally get a much-needed shower my travels have kept me from for too many days in a row now, and then enjoy the evening before packing up tomorrow and heading the two miles further up the canyon to my new site, where I anticipate spending a couple of weeks enjoying the peace and quiet of the great outdoors, and mountain biking again!