Pacific Northwest Backroad Adventures

A couple of my coworkers (Adam and James) had been planing a trail run to Evans Creek ORV for a little over week. My wife had plans to volunteer that day so I kept saying no. Finally, Thursday came and Adam needed to use my jigsaw to do a little wheel well trimming on his Jeep. Well my wife’s plans for the day changed and she said to go. Sweet.

Knowing very well that the trail system at the Evans Creek ORV area was not designed to larger vehicles like my Toyota FJ80 Land Cruiser, my intent was that we would stick to the easier trails and/or forest roads. So off we went for the day’s adventure.

Once we pulled into the parking lot of the Evans Creek, we were met by a group of three other Jeeps. We decided to tag along. The emotional fun of wheeling overcame my common sense that my Land Cruiser may not fit on the trails. Luckily there there was minimal recent rain.

I’m not sure what trail we started on because there was no sign (unless I missed it). I know it was just west of the day use parking area. We started off climbing from the road shortly an obstacle that gave a couple of the Jeeps a challenge. Basically the key was to keep to the left of a few rocks in the trail (easier said then done). The long wheelbase of my Land Cruiser definitely helped in this section. Because the trail was relatively dry, it was a pretty easy time in my FJ80 and the trail provided plenty of width to navigate my 112 inch wheelbase through the obstacles (if you’re not familiar with my Land Cruiser, I’m only running an 2.5 OME lift, 31 inch BFG AT tires and unlocked diffs).

We eventually came to trail 198 (which was marked “most difficult”). I was having fun and the trail wasn’t bad so far, so I decided to continue with the group. Well this section of trail ended up being very tight for my 80-series pig. There was quite a few close calls where the off camber sections would push me very close obstacles along side of the trail. I made several attempts to get around certain root but in the end, my flare hit it and I heard a cracking sound. I thought the flair was toast. Somehow, I managed to get by with only deep scrapes in my left rear fender flair.

A little further down the trail, there was a turn that I didn’t think I could make so I tried a alternate route. The path would initially lead me between two trees (with minimal clearance on each side). I should have gotten out and sized up the obstacle first, but I didn’t. I drove up over the roots of the tree and then got high centered on my side steps when my front tires dropped into the hole on the other side. Had I built up a ramp with readily available materials (logs and rocks) I probably would have negotiated the obstacle. To continue, I had to get winched off (the only time all day). After that, the trail was still tight but I was able pass the remaining tight sections with out problem (just throw in a few multi-point turns and some spotting).

After we reached the gravel forest road, we headed up Forest Road 7930 until we reached the ridge. Normally you have a great view of Mt. Rainier from this location but today, you could only see the lower part of the glaciers. In the opposite direction, there are views of the Puget Sound lowlands, however those views were limited by the cloud cover.

By this time, one of the Jeeps in the group headed out, so we took a little time to fire a few rounds through our guns. It had been a while since I shot my 9mm Ruger, but I was actually able to hit a fairly decent grouping at 20 yards. Adam had his .44 Smith cannon and shot a few rounds also.

After making some noise, we headed down to the main road in, stopping to play and take some photos along the way.

We were able to air up at Chuck’s Service & Gas in Wilkeson. We real appreciated the hospitality because air is not a normally provided service. At one time it was, but a few people ruined for everybody.

It was a fun day. If the weather was clear, I could have had some great pictures of Mt. Rainier. I got lucky that the conditions were mostly dry (except for a few puddles). If it had been wetter conditions, my BFG ATs would not have had any traction and I would have probably ended up sliding into something and denting a quarter panel (like James in his Cherokee). The only damage I suffered was some deep scrapes in the left rear fender flare and a little tweaking of my side steps. Would I take my Land Cruiser on those trails again? On the forest roads, not a problem. On the 4WD trails. Nope. The FJ80 is just too much body and wheelbase.

You can view all of the photos from this trail run at Evans Creek Trail Run Photos.

Since most of what I needed to do at home required me to have dry weather to work on, I decided to take a ride to the forest lands above Wilkeson, Washington. Luckily for me, from my front door to the gravel forest roads of the Wilkeson Tree Farm (owned by Plum Creek) is exactly 20 miles. The drive time, depending on traffic will vary from 30-60 minutes. My goal was to explore Forest Service (FS) Road 7720. It had been a few years since my last visit to the area.

Unfortunately, the weather did not allow for the great views of the Puget Sound lowlands below or to Mt. Rainier above. I’ll have to save that for another trip.

I started out from downtown Wilkeson, Washington and turned on Railroad Ave and drove past the historic Wilkeson School (the oldest operating elementary school building in Washington state), past the old Coke Ovens and the Wilkeson Sandstone Quarry and then turned up the hill near the entrance of the Sunset Lake Camp. None of the roads in this area have signs. The only road that shows on the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest map is FS 7720. My GPS initially listed this road as the South Prairie Creek Road.

Once I climbed out of the valley, there is a section of the road that is the haul road for another quarry further up the road. After a short distance, there is a fork in the road, with the quarry road to the left (very obvious) and FS 7710 to the right. In a short distance I turned left on FS 7720 and followed it up the South Prairie Creek valley.

It wasn’t too long after this that my GPS showed no roads. So with no map or GPS showing the roads, I began to explore the area. I decided to drive up to roads end and work my way back down as time allowed. I climbed for a while when I came to a junction with two well used roads. First I chose the road to the right which dead ended in about two miles. Some great views through the mist. Probably better on a clear day. So I backtracked down to the last junction.

Next, I followed the road to the left. From what I could tell from the forest service map and the geography, this road was FS 7720. From this junction, the road was overgrown with alder trees in sections, steep, rocky and rutted in others. A high clearance vehicle would be recommended to travel this area of road. After passing multiple forks in the road, while staying to the left, I eventually came to an overlook into the valley and Cedar Lake. A nice mountain lake downhill from my vantage point. There appears to be a road within a relatively short distance from the lake’s outlet (it would still require a hike through the brush), but from where I was standing and without a map, I couldn’t tell you how to get to the road.

While looking at the forest service map, I noted that there was a trailhead for Trail 1178 at the end of the road (only a short distance further). Once I got home and started writing this trip report, I found out that this was the Clearwater Trail #1178. After some photos of Cedar Lake and driving to the end of the road, I turned around and started heading down for further explorations.

Some of the spur roads I explored dead ended rather quickly, some were very overgrown with alder trees. Limb risers on my Land Cruiser would have been nice, or just simply turning around as what I had to do on FS 7724 because it was too overgrown.

Because of time limitations and a storm blowing in with visibility dropping to about 50 yards, I opted to head home for the day around 3:00 PM. I made note of some of the other roads I needed to explore on a future trip to the Wilkeson Tree Farm.

You can view all of the photos from this trip at Wilkeson Forest Roads.

Anytime I’m traveling through Eatonville, Washington to get back to my home in Edgewood, one of my favorite routes to miss the infamous State Route (SR) 161 traffic through Graham and South Hill is to take the leisurely scenic drive on Orville Road East through the Ohop Valley, past Lake Kapowsin and into the Puyallup Valley to Orting. My description of this route will be from the town of Eatonville heading towards Orting.

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