BRD Update 5/21/2010

[cfr]

Called the Boulder Ranger District today and asked if they'd opened anything recently,

1. Taylor Mountain / Bright Trail
2. Winiger Ridge/Gross Reservoir
3. Bunce School Road (always open)

They must've also updated the status page because it's correct as of today,

http://www.fs.fed.us/r2/arnf/conditions/forest-roads/brd/index.shtml

[Rob]

Nice. I wonder, though, if that means Bunce is open all the way to CR 92/Camp Dick. If so, that means T-33 is accessible.

[Brody]

3. Bunce School Road (always open)



That is a bit of a misnomer. Bunce has a seasonal gate closer a little over 4 miles in that prevents you from accessing T33A and the return down to Camp Dick. Sure, it is "always open", but only to the gate if the gate is closed.

To answer the question, Rob, you may have to call the FS to find out as their website is only going to show the "always open" status. There are so few Rangers working that you will get an accurate answer as the person beind the phone will know the person who is or is going to be opening the gates. you will have to specifically ask if the seasonal gate on Bunce down to Camp Dick is open or not.

[Rob]

That is a bit of a misnomer. Bunce has a seasonal gate closer a little over 4 miles in that prevents you from accessing T33A and the return down to Camp Dick. Sure, it is "always open", but only to the gate if the gate is closed.

To answer the question, Rob, you may have to call the FS to find out as their website is only going to show the "always open" status.

To clarify, Bunce is always open, except the part that's gated from Camp Dick to just past the T33A trailhead. The FS lists it as closed when the gates are closed, so when it's listed as open, that means the gates are open (though you can't trust the road status page 100 percent, as I've found out the hard way).

So I did an FJ Cruiser run up Bunce today with some guys I hadn't wheeled with in a couple of years, kind of on the spur of the moment. So it wouldn't be a vehicle-specific run, I took the 40. The 40 did everything the FJCs did, but with 31s instead of the 34s and 35s everyone else had and no lockers. Love the 40.

The Bunce gates, indeed, are open, just as the BRD site said. Did a quick run up Ironclads first (it's bone dry), then headed down to T33. We got almost to the end (where it starts getting narrow and snaky) before we hit snowdrifts that weren't worth busting through, particularly as narrow as the trail gets; it would have been a pinball fest. Another week or two and I'll bet it'll be runnable all the way to the end. There's a fair amount of runoff coming down parts of the trail now.

One quick note. It's easy to miss the turnoff up 203 (if you do, you end up on dead end 203A), because a downed tree is blocking most of the entrance, though you can squeeze through. Wish I'd had a chain saw with me.

There's one tricky spot on T33 where you have to squeeze between a tree and a snowbank and it's off-camber so the snow bank (and rock under it) push you toward the tree. I think I clipped the tree with the left rear of the 40 going up the trail. This photo is of us coming back down the trail after getting denied by deep snow.

12224

[cfr]

Stopped by the BRD office in Boulder today,

1. Beaver bog road opened this morning.
2. Magnolia south end near Rollinsville expected to open this afternoon

They said probably mid-June for some of the other trails.