****** WINTER WEATHER UPDATE *****
Creek Hanauer
April 4, 2010
From my dear friend and downriver correspondent, from whom I am separated by Reality:
Creek, April 1, 2010
The contractor has finally started moving rubble on the down river side of the Birthday Slide. How long has it been since it fell? (March 4, Mugg’s B’day.) Anyway, they have a backhoe, an excavator and two 10-yard dump trucks. The waste fill site is at Oak Bottom. They also still have two or three people on harnesses scaling loose boulders perched above the slide and the driver of one of the trucks warned me as I headed up to shoot the attached photo that I should approach with caution.
The crew, from Yreka, is small but game. They’ve been up there scaling on what must be a near-vertical wall of mud 250-300 feet above the river through some very wet weather. Hard not to admire their pluck.
When I was there at 10:00 this morning, it was clear that there was no longer a trail on our side the slide.
Malcolm Terence
From above the Birthday Slide, having medical appointments on the coast looks like this:
If it’s not snowing (Thursday) one drives up the South Fork to Callahan, Hwy 3 over Scott Mountain, 5400 feet, to Trinity Center to Weaverville and Hwy 299 (2 ½ hours.) Turn Right. Two hours later you’re in Arcata.
If it is not only a weekend, but heavy snow has fallen above 3 or 4000 feet then “they” don’t plow Scott Mt. So your trip coming home (Saturday) from those coastal appointments looks like this:
Pretty much the normal trip in thru Willow Creek, Weitchepec, then up the Klamath to Orleans where you now detour around the Klamath River slide using the Ishi Pishi Rd. (Ishi Pishi Rd., think Salmon River Road with Klamath River traffic) only 15 extra minutes.) Once you arrive in Somes Bar, you cast a longing look at the road that would have you home in under an hour and turn left toward Happy Camp, past Seiad Valley to the mouth of the Scott River where one turns right and travels into the Scott Valley. Turn right on Hwy 3 in Fort Jones and pretend you’re coming home from Yreka. Simple and only a 6½ hour drive, beginning to end!
Friday, March 12, 2010
( New update 3-28-2010 it looks like maybe a month before the forks road is open for travel)
The main road into the immediate region from Somes Bar into Forks of Salmon has recently experienced a landslide resulting in some 30 feet of the road being thrown some 200 feet into the Salmon River down below. The road is closed and the Forest Service IS issuing citations for anyone attempting to cross the slide are on foot. This is still considered a very dangerous area. The road is speculated to be closed for a minimum of a month. It is advised that people use the route from the east via Interstate 5 through HWY 299 to Weaverville and up to Cecilville. From there one can head towards Forks of Salmon on the Salmon River road. In the alternative, one can travel from I-5 out of Yreka to Sawyers Bar and take Eddy Gulch road to Black Bear Summit and into the ranch.
The last option is for traveling in from the coast. Coming into Orleans, one needs to continue on into Happy Camp and through Scott Valley to connect with the previous route coming into Sawyers Bar. These are the only options for getting in here at the moment.
We had celebrated the seasonal holidays, the equinoxes and the solstices, from the time we started the Black Bear Ranch Commune in 1968. I thought about those early days as we navigated the tangle of log roads leading into Black Bear for what would be the 40th summer solstice this June. A couple hundred people were expected and it was hard not to dwell a little in the past. Salmon River country is forests, and steep terrain. It’s that way where I live these days, down near the bottom of the river, and it’s even more that way up at the commune. Even the dust and the bumps seemed familiar.