Sean Thomas’s recent report reminded me that I should investigate the goings-on at Coyote Wall since the Field Guide needs some updating in this area. As an aside, I should note that I have been familiar with Coyote Wall since the early 90s, when it was mostly a mountain biking mecca: it was bikers who built the trails down in the canyon, for example. As the years went on, it became a favorite place for me to take people who weren’t really strong hikers but who appreciated the whole ambience of the massive syncline, the oak woodlands, the expansive views, the poison oak and, in season, the wildflowers, ticks and rattlesnakes (Also, I got the only skunk spray of my life in the Labyrinth). For better or worse, other hikers, as well as William L. Sullivan, also “discovered” the area and it became increasingly crowded. Mountain bikers zipped in and out and were given much freedom by private landowners; hikers and their dogs passed through more slowly and sometimes noisily, strayed from the trails and onto private property, often deposited litter and other things (think human waste) and the whole escalation in use and occasional misuse led to the current Forest Service plan to regulate the area.
My plan was to follow the course of what might be a future loop, heading first up the scabland slope of Burdoin Mountain and then down Atwood Road to pick up the Coyote Wall Trail.
DISCLAIMER: The path I took on the western half of this loop is NOT recommended: the interface with private property is not always clear and there are no established trails except trails which are now closed. The route I followed in general shows up as dotted lines, i.e. proposed trails, in the B1 and B2 sections of the
USFS Recreation Plan.
From the trailhead, I walked Courtney Road up to the fifth switchback. Here a muddy track leads to an expansive view to the river, Eighteenmile Island and the tribal clearcut on the Oregon side. There’s a fence here, so I headed up the slope on a dent in the grass which is a former jeep track. This dent leads up through poison oak and an oak copse to another road bed. Here I turned left and continued up the slope. I could see USFS boundary stakes to my left and right. I passed a vernal pool and an old foundation before reaching a gravel road that turned out to be a private drive. There is USFS land across this road, but also some private homes and no defined track. I did not feel comfortable just heading into the woods here (I was now above the Bretz flood line and into Douglas-firs and ponderosas) to become a possible chew toy for someone’s Rottweiler, so I walked down the private drive to Courtney Road.
I walked up the road again to where it veered left. A few hundred yards later, past a road named Rainbow’s End, I encountered USFS property markers again. I headed back into the woods; this area has been extensively thinned in recent years and I felt safe on the west side of the thinning project markers. I picked up a vague track that led close to the back yard of a house and reached USFS Road 1858-228, really a muddy track. Here also was posted a No Trespassing sign, which I believe itself was trespassing on USFS property. The road split and I went off on Road 230, also labeled, until I reached a huge debris pile. By now I was in a familiar area because down in a depression I saw the east end of the Coyote Meadows bikers trail as it headed west from the junction with the Wizard Trail. I went west on this trail under a Douglas-fir canopy. A couple of mountain bikers came zipping by. As I got close to Courtney Road, a Forest Service sign told me the trail I was on was closed to protect private property. Well, I headed out to Courtney Road anyway. The road is gravel from here up and there is a new fence blocking the original trail access.
The upshot is that neither the area shown as B2 nor the northern B1 section has viable trails at this time.
Don’t go there (even if you see mountain bikers using it with abandon)! Across from the Meadows Trail access to Courtney Road, ironically, is a sign on a gate posted by the private Kreps Ranch asking bikers and hikers to please close gates behind them. Trails on this private land ARE open to the public, with some periodic closures and restrictions.
So I walked up Courtney Road some more, mostly in forest without views, until I attained a switchback with broad and sweeping vistas west. The Rattlesnake Ridge Trail leads off from this viewpoint on the road, part of the system on private land which includes Kreps Ranch and SDS Timber property. These trails are the Hospital Hill complex, which runs between here and White Salmon. Please note that Kreps and SDS prefer not to have detailed online postings about these trails (although they do post online about restrictions and closures); they don’t want the kind of attention and traffic that Coyote Wall gets.
A deer mouse on Courtney decided freezing in a mouse-like way was the most effective deterrent to predation and allowed me within a few inches to take its portrait.
Then it was on to Atwood Road, which from Courtney runs along the top of Coyote Wall. Much signage has been put up here, mainly to note that Atwood is a county road, but that users need to stay on the track. Soon Atwood ceased to be a road, gradually descended past a couple of big, gnarly Douglas-firs, and at a four-way junction, met up with the Crybaby Trail. I took this narrow bikers trail along the rim of the wall through oak copses and clumps of poison oak and balsamroot. The views were beginning to materialize and there was a brisk breeze from the west. Vultures whooshed up from the canyon to clip the rim and spiral upward. Soon, Crybaby passes the junction with the Wizard Trail and joins with Trail Co1 (
See the map) near the lone ponderosa at McMahon Point.
I followed Co1 down to Co3 (Little Moab), took that out to Co4, hit the old highway and then the new trailhead. Wildflowers were best in the seeps on Co4 near the highway. Pungent desert-parsley was in full bloom all along the precipice. A meadowlark tinkled its territorial call from the top of a young ponderosa pine. A horned lark didn’t want to fly up into the wind, so it was easy to stalk for a photo. Looking down into the now closed Coyote Canyon area, I could see a few new homes, reason enough, I suppose to shut the public out of trekking across little squares of private land, some of which are now built on.
Note that there are no trail junction signs anywhere. Trail names come from the mountain biking community or sexy Forest Service lingo (Co1, Co2, etc.).
