[lupinsea]

Lake Isabel Trail Run
Reiter Trail Network
(Near Seattle)

August 4th, 2007




Trail Map of the Lake Isabel Trail

Last Saturday I met up with some friends from a Jeep board to do some wheel'n at one of the trail networks here in the NW. The exhaulted status of Wagon Master (trail leader) was foisted upon me since apparently they thought I knew where I was going. :lol: Some of the guys on the run had come up from Oregon, one form northern California, and there were some locals such as myself and a few other guys.

We ran the Lake Isabel Trail in the Reiter Trails network located 45 minutes NE from Seattle on Hwy 2. Reiter Trails is a bit of a wild and wooly no-mans land right now. The county recently decided to start turning it into an official ORV park (a good thing) but the process will take close to 10 years. In the mean time the state DNR is beginning to patrol the area regularly (another good thing) to help clamp down on drunk wheelers, people dumping trash, starting burn piles on fire, and all sorts of poor behavior. A number of local 4x4 and offroad groups have been working hard over the years trying to keep this place clean.

Our group arrived at the trailhead and began prepping for the run by airing down tires, disconnecting swaybars, dropping tops and powering up the GPS units for some trail tracking. The skies overhead were cloudy this summer day and the air was cool, but not cold, very nice in other words. One of the DNR rangers showed up and I had a chance to talk to her. She was a nice lady just doing her job patrolling the place and keeping an eye on everything. I talked to her as she put a removal tag on an abandon rig. It's stuff like this that'll get these places shut down. Note to others who want to go here, keep the place cleaned up and be nice. Let's help these rangers help us keep these trails open because she did want to see this place turned into an offical ORV park, too.

A short 1 minute drive from the main parking lot the trail starts off under some powerlines and runs flat for perhaps 1/2 mile, splashing through large puddles, before reaching a river crossing. We took the lower crossing (shallower but longer) and had no problems with the low water levels at this time of the year. On the other side the trail continued through a dense jungle of hazlenut trees, vine maples, salmon berry bushes all in the dappled shadows of tall giant maple trees covered in moss.

At the hairpin switch back we scrambled up a rock wall and the trail started getting intersting from here as it began its 2000 ft climb toward the lake. Along the way we encountered some trail traffic and had to wait for rigs to clear a rock outcropping on a steep hillclimb. Near the top the trail became very rocky with a fun 2 ft rock ledge in the middle of the trail. Again, more waiting as the group in front of us cleared the obstacle and then another pause as we worked to get our own group up and over.

Shortly there after we came upon an old log bridge crossing May Creek. By this point in the day the skies were starting to break and patch of sun penetrated the forest canopy to light the trail. On the other side of the bridge the trail deteriorates into a quarter - to - half mile long rock wash. Progress was very slow as the Jeeps creeped over beachball-sized boulders that would roll under our tires. One driver even managed to get his Jeep caught over one of these. At the top of the wash was a tricky 90* turn through boulders which necessitated slow, methodical Jeep'n to avoid getting hung up on axles and frame brackets.

We reached the end of the trail which dead-ends just beyond the foot path to Lake Isabel. Given the time involved reaching this point we didn't hike into the lake, that will have to be saved for another time.

On the return down the way we came one of the drivers missed a line by 12" and pitched his Jeep into a 75* lean. The only thing that saved him from completely rolling over was his rocker guards. With two winches in action, one pulling from the rear, the other from the side off a snatchblock, we got him safely back on his tires and continued down almost without another incident.

About halfway down the mountain one of the Jeeps threw a front driveshaft when the u-joint cap fellout. Given that we were headed down hill the driver opted to pull the driveshaft and just toss it in back. There were no more problems until we got to the river crossing and took the second crossing point. Shorter but slightly deeper it was the better choice as it was easier to pull him up the bank on the opposite side. From there it was an easy drive through puddles back to the trail head where we packed up, aired up, and headed out. The sun had finally burned off the clouds and our convoy was treated to a pleasant sunset on the drive home.

It was a good day of Jeep'n that saw us cover 8 miles of trail in about 7 hrs.

More photos on my website, here.



Elevation Profile of the Lake Isabel Trail





Crossing May Creek at the lower water crossing.





My friend in his yellow Jeep taking some poser pics on rocks in the creek.





Climbing the rock wall at the hairpin.





Regrouping at the top of the rock wall. The trail follows an old logging roadbed.
Some sections of which are still in good condition.





Crossing one of the many washed out culverts along the way. Barely visible
to the left are the remains of the wooden pipe.





Encountering other trail traffic. That's me way up ahead holding a map
with one of the other group's drivers pointing at it.





We caught up with the other group again. It was impressive to see the
terrain the Grand Cherokee was driving over. You don't see many of those
on the trail. This one was running 31" tires and a 3 1/2" lift.

[lupinsea]

Yours turly driving up the rock ledge.





One of the others of our group doing the same in his YJ with the folded windsheild.





The road becomes more rocky as it moves through shaded woods.





Crossing the old log bridge toward the top of the trail. Hopefully it'll be around
for a long while, it'll be a PITA to replace it when it goes.





One of the Jeeps got hung up on a rock and everyone had to rock him over to
one side so the rock could be rolled out of the way.





Above the bridge the road turns into a rock wash. Large boulders made this
90* left turn trick to negotiatate. Here the rig is hung-up on it's axles and
everyone is surveying the situation to figure the best way forward.





About 300 ft before the end of the trail you can see out and down the
valley we drove up. It looks out over the river below.





Someone had carefully stacked these stones
and so we carefully left them in place. They left
us wondering if they had somehow been secured
together with glue or who knows what?





After the convoy turned around I was now in back. Trying to come
through that tight 90* turn again.

[lupinsea]

Woops. Missed the line by 12" comging down the rock ledge.





The driver mentioned somthing about his leg was about ready to fall off from
holding the brakes whie we hooked up the winches. . . . whatever. Wah wah wah. . .





Coming through the upper creek crossing. . . almost back to the trail head.

Trailhead Directions
Getting to Reiter Trails is fairly easy and the trail network is approximately 45 min - 1 hr NE of Seattle.

1. Find Monroe, WA on a map.
2. Follow US Hwy 2 east for approximately 16 miles to the town of Goldbar, WA.
3. Keep going through town and about 1-2 miles on the other side (before US 2 crosses the river) take a left turn onto Reiter Rd.
4. Follow Reiter Rd and keep to the right when the road makes a sharp 80* branch to the left.
5. In roughly a half mile or so you'll round a bend and come upon a vast gravel parking lot / play area on the left. This is the parking lot for the Reiter Trails area.

Facilities, Features
Reiter trails is just starting to be convered to a new ORV park. As such it has limited amenities right now. This means packing out what you carred with you and there are no toilets. If ya gotta go in the woods, bring a shovel and burry it (and the TP). Let's keep the place clean.

Extended stays are allowed but DNR requests you not stay longer than 14 days (w/ motor homes, tents, etc.)

There are a bunch of other trails besides Lake Isabel. I've been there 4 times and I'm still learning the place. Search for the Index Wall Trail. And there are massive boulder strewn rock gardens in the forest, motorbike and ATV rails, sand hills under the power lines, etc.

[XJK]

wow, looks like a very nice run. great pictures

-Kyle

[jonwood]

Nice pics I like that trail its alot of fun, May creek sure is low this time of year
I think this was in April

[CBlakeNS]

Great pictures and post!

[Vacant Stare]

Looks like a great trip. I have yet to set foot (tire?) in the Reiter trail system- it looks like a lot of fun.

[Rubi22]

great post, great pictures..

the picture of those stacked rocks is insane!!

[SirGCal]

finally... a real trail report... :-)

[Kahu]

Originally Posted by SirGCal

finally... a real trail report... :-)

yes. I look forward to lupinseas trail posts. always good info and great pics!

[wjb4000]

Yeah, thanks for the pictures and report. I love reading reports like this one, with the pictures to back it up! Great post.

Josh

[newcaddy4j]

awesome write up... wish we had views like that back east

[lupinsea]

Thanks guys!


Wow, Jonwood, that's nuts. I think my Jeep would float away if I tried crossing May Creek when it's that deep. Good to know.

Vacant, Kizer and I are going to try mapping out the trails we run on and one of the places we especially want to map out is Reiter since there's such a crappy and inaccurate map of the place. If you want, we can let you know when we're heading up.

[Incadude]

Awesome!

[jonwood]

Originally Posted by lupinsea

Thanks guys!




Vacant, Kizer and I are going to try mapping out the trails we run on and one of the places we especially want to map out is Reiter since there's such a crappy and inaccurate map of the place. If you want, we can let you know when we're heading up.

A better map of that place would be GREAT. Im re -building the Jeep right now but if you need any help I'll do what I can