SPOKANE Area Riders

Does anyone know if there is a dyno in Spokane or Coeurdalene area? Thanks

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Pete

So, I know where Sullivan Lake and Salmo Mountain are (grew up camping there). But...where is Road 302? This sounds cool. I love riding up there and make fairly frequent trips up there in the summer... can someone show me on a map or give general directions as to where this starts/ends?

I'm not the best at describing the area, but I'm pretty sure FS302/West Side Road starts when the pavement ends north of Nordman on Hwy 57. From there, I think we turned onto FS22 to get to Metaline Falls. (pg 50 in my Benchmark Road & Recreation Atlas )

And I have not heard of a local dyno tuner, BTW. I know a mobile dude shows up once or twice a year at Empire Cycle in the Valley.

Found it! Thanks. I'm gonna jump on the 650 and ride up there tomorrow!

If you are riding, we'll be taking off Thursday late morning, possibly after meeting up at Westside Motorsports. Anyone else?

Road 302 from the east, it also road 22 from the west.(same road) is under construction today. Don't know when they started bit it will last about 6weeks. It will be a very smooth road when done. Great crew, keeping the worst to a minimum. Give them a break.

I had to drive over about 100 yards of equivalent to roughly plowed ground with big rocks. Doable with a KLR but not fun. They are only tearing up 300 yards or so at a time then smoothing it down.

Smaller bikes and dirt oriented ones should do OK. Larger and heaver bikes or bikes with road tires should wait a couple of weeks.
Ride safe, change the gas often. jerry

I only saw snow in two places, the largest was just before (west) of Pass Creek Pass.

I was going to post this same thing. We made it fine (3 BMW XChallenges), but there are some mucky spots. Smooth as a baby's butt for about two miles on the Idaho side, though!

The road crew said that there were a couple of bikes ahead of me... I never saw them.

I was dragging my skid plate in the foot deep soft stuff going down hill. Plans were to go West to East grab a bite at Nordman or..... then return the same way, then on to Boundary Dam. No way did I want to try that up hill in foot deep dirt and rocks. :eek1

It was a good ride with only a little rain.

Ride safe, change the gas often. jerry

OK, F.S. Rd 302 and 22 have been conquered, where to next? Any ideas? I'm game for next sunday, any ideas?

yeah...Know of any cool routes up in them thar hills of WA/ID/MT?

Have you tried going from Bunco Road to Clark Fork yet? Nice ride with pretty mild gravel FS roads.

Anyone here taken the Idaho Star motorcycle safety classes? If so, what was your experience like? My wife just took the Basic II last weekend, I signed up for the "Experienced" class being held this Sunday. I hope to pick up something new.

Another great ride is Bunco to Avery through Wallace. We did this yesterday on our way home from a dual sport trip in the Avery/Clarkia area for three days. I think it was almost 150 miles, mostly dirt except around Wallace and just north. I have the GPS track, plus one track of an alternate route that shortens the trip by adding a few more miles of pavement.

Terrain is mostly dirt roads, but Spruce Ridge road has some mildly challenging ruts on the outside track, still plenty of room to keep out of the ruts...

There are several nice routes to take for that ride. Did you take Bunco on through till it turns south at the ID/MT border? (I think it's the 290 road there, could be wrong) It getS real pretty there-but I'm afraid snow would still be on that part.

Not all the way to MT border, as I was concerned about snow since we hit snow trying to get up to Sheefoot near Avery. This was our last day and my wife was getting of tired, so didn't want to take too many excursions since I knew it was going to be a 10 hour day without taking risks. She wanted to spend another night in the mountains, but I had to get back to work...

I'm looking forward to exploring some more this summer. You mention Avery-Clarkia-did you do any exploring around Marble Creek? It's interesting, there is quite a bit of logging history, a neat old tunnel just off the main road and some side trips-Line Creek Camp is a nice hike.

Shefoot is one of the real wonders of our area. Amazing view...especially if you like heights. It's got to be upwards of 1000 feet straight down (actually overhung!) from that plateau. My top 4 for favorite view places in our area are Shefoot, Spion Kop, Bernard Overlook and Sandpoint Baldy.

Funny that you brought up Shefoot--last night I was at a meeting at Kellys-got chatting with a newcomer to the area on a bike (Victory, not adventure) afterwards and he asked about Shefoot-he's going to propose to his GF and someone mentioned it as an awesome spot, he thought he might pop the question there. Great spot for it. I guess anyway-given the drop....not the place to "freak out".

Is access to Shefoot Big-Bike friendly? Can I get my Tiger 1050 up there or is it more a dirt bike only thing?

Twopeace, no problem getting your Tiger 1050 up to Sheefoot once the snow melts. I ride my wife on a Tiger 800XC without any problems. Some spots have ruts, but there is plenty of room on each side to pass safely. In addition, it's also pretty easy to find off Moon Pass road, just pay attention to blind corners on the short section where the shuttle buses run, as some drivers are flat nuts. I stay in my lane and ride slow...1st gear...around the couple of blind corners.

If you come in from Wallace, you can take Slate Creek south off of Moon pass just after the road turns to dirt. We rode this up and back last weekend (16 miles from end to end) and they have widened the road since last year. Was more of a four wheeler trail, now wide enough for a truck, but we didn't have any issue getting around trucks coming the other way. The first couple of miles has some rock, but wasn't really a problem going down and back up, just look ahead and you will see the lines around the couple of really rocky sections. We like riding the more technical lines, so we went through/over each rocky section, so totally passable on an your Tiger.

Once you get to the St. Joe river, turn east towards Avery. Just after Avery, one route is to go north on Moon Pass road. There are 7 one lane tunnels that are a little scary the first time, but since you are on a bike, you can pull to the side in the tunnels if you happen to meet an oncoming vehicle. You can miss all of the tunnels by crossing the bridge after Avery and taking the four wheeler trail on the east side of the river. The trail will turn into an old road and will go under a tall bridge after the campground. Stay on the old road and you will be on the west side of the river. This road circles back to Moon Pass road, which you will cross. This is the bus section for a couple of miles, so not the time to get in a hurry. At the fork, buses go left, but stay to the right and you are about 15 miles from Sheefoot.

This is a great day ride if you go up the freeway to Wallace (you can make good time on the freeway so cover a lot of miles quickly) then to Slate Creek and on to Sheefoot. Well worth the time spent and lot of scenery. On Monday, we came accross Moose on 3 occasions, two Elk, several deer (one with a fawn only a few days old) and a bear. Don't stop for the Moose or Bear, as both are too dangerous to risk a photo op, but cool to see.

If you want to make it a loop, go back out to Avery and follow the St Joe river to St. Maries, then to Plummer and home. If you need more dirt action, Benewah Creek road about 10 miles outside of St. Maries is an easy road and will take you to Highway 95. You can take Desmet road just south of Tensed towards McCrowsky OHV access and it will take you to Farmington road. Turn north and you will hit Highway 27.

I built a couple of quick GPS routes and have attached the route to Sheefoot (couldn't attach the second file). It's about 150 miles to Sheefoot, and 162 miles home through Tensed, so a full day of riding, but the freeway at the beginning burns a lot of those miles quickly so you can get to the dirt for the fun.