The Sun is Still Shining, So Let's Go Exploring!

Today was another beautiful, freezing cold sunny day. Karen and I wanted to go gravel riding (of course we did--I don't think we ever don't want to go gravel riding). Jan wanted to join us, so the three of us met at the Rock Candy Mtn Trailhead parking lot. We wanted to do some exploring on the Green Diamond property near Summit Lake. This is where we went last weekend to get to Kennedy Falls. Although we didn't want to do the hike-a-bike trail to the falls this time, there were lots of other gravel roads to check out. 

We remembered taking a left once we were on the gravel last week. When we came to a fork, we went left, thinking we were going the same way as last time. Well, we weren't. As we were riding along, I said to Karen, "Do you remember this part?" She said, "I don't remember riding through this Winnie-the-Pooh woods part." I didn't either. But hey, we were exploring! We came to where another road went right. I thought maybe it would take us to the road we had been on last week. It seemed like if we continued on the road we were on, it would take us back to Summit Lake Rd (further down). We didn't want that, so we took the other road. It went a quarter of a mile or so, then dead ended. We turned around and came back. Then we went back to where we had made the erroneous left. Once we were on the other road, I remembered it. The correct left was just further than I had remembered. 

We made the correct turn, then down a steepish hill to a sharp right turn to get down to another road (2720). We passed the trail to the falls (we stopped and showed it to Jan). This time we continued on. After awhile, we came to another spur road (2710). I was pretty sure (but not positive) if we continued on 2720, we would eventually come to the intersection we had been at last week that led down down down to Old Olympic Hwy. So, we turned on 2710. It was a nice road, but it, too, dead ended. As we were coming back, I could see another, somewhat less traveled road dropping off to our left. We decided to save exploring that one for another day. 

We came back to 2720, and rode back the way we had come. Every road we passed, I thought to myself, I wonder where that one leads to? All roads for another day! 

We made it back to the pavement, then back to the cars. At 16.7 miles, it wasn't the longest ride, but it was fun exploring new roads.

Here's a couple of photos...

Hwy 101 is somewhere off in the distance (we could hear the traffic)

Selfie time! Jan, Karen, and me.