Weekend trip up to the Kern Plateau

[KSL22]

We left Thursday just after noon and hit the highway. With me for this adventure were my 11 yr old twins. We headed up 9 Mile Canyon after a quick stop to top off the fuel tank at Pearsonville Shell. It sure was nice going up the hill without the extra 12,000 pounds of my toyhauler behind me. We decided not to make our usual stop at the Kennedy Meadows general store, and head straight for the trail head. Once we hit dirt we aired down to trail pressure.

The trail down into the meadows is a easy fun trail. It winds through the trees with large banked turns. I could see myself playing race car driver if I was in a much smaller vehicle. As it was I had to plan my corners to keep off the trees. There is one rocky downhill on the trail but it is nothing a vehicle off the showroom floor couldn't make it through. There is also a large granite slab you can choose to go down if you want some excitement. I lined up a little off the proper line and teeter tottered a bit between the the drivers front and passenger rear tires until the passenger front settled in.

Once you hit the meadows the real reason to come up here becomes evident. Miles of two track everywhere. We were still trying to beat the sunset for camp set up so we went straight for our destination. I would do a little exploring before I left.


We kept on the main trail all the way to the sign directing us to the river campsites. The trial up through the trees and then down to the water is a little rougher and it got tight again in a few places, but nothing bad enough to pull in the mirrors.


Who doesn't love a river crossing. I was looking forward to the water crossing I knew as a kid in the 80's on my XR80 with water up to my knees. The raging river a hundred yards across from bank to bank with rough rocky bottom. What I found was a foot deep and barely moving.


Some one had the end spot so we back tracked a few spots and found a nice location to set up the tent. The water level is really down but it is still beautiful and the kids had fun chasing fish.

 

[KSL22]

That night I set my chair up in a nice spot where I could see the stars through the trees and convinced my son to do the same. I had already found and pointed out a few satellites when I made a comment about "too bad there isn't a meteor shower tonight". Just as I finished the statement a light streaked across the sky right overhead with a crazy tail. So we spent the next hour or so staring up at the sky as space hurdled rocks into our atmosphere.

The next morning we woke up and I cooked breakfast sandwiches and made myself some yuppie instant coffee with the jetboil and Starbucks VIA ready brew packets. After the sun came up enough to warm us up we packed up the tackle and poles and headed up river looking for some better holes and the fish dam I remembered from a long, long time ago. We didn't find much below the dam other than beaver dams so we kept heading up river.


The top of the dam was a place of beauty. When we first got up there we struggled to find our way across the grass to some of the holes on the other side of the valley. Once we dipped our boots in the mud a few times we stopped caring and just trudged through the water.


Doing some casting.


Coming back to camp with their catch.


More to come...

 

[KSL22]

And now, back to our scheduled program...

Once back at camp we cooked some lunch including the trout as a snack. Once refueled the kids went to the water and tried catching some of the fish swimming in the area. After getting bored and not having much success with the poles, my daughter got in the water and tried catching them by hand. She ended up finding their hiding place and was able to noodle them out of the bank.


Unfortunately they are not trout as these "sucker fish" have invaded the area. They feed on the other species eggs which has not done good for the trout population. So all they caught became critter food on the other side of the bank. I think they ended up removing around ten of these from the river before the trip was over. And before anyone cries foul, I have always raised them on the "if you kill it, you eat it" motto. These are a parasite to the area so I made an exception.


After playing in the water for a bit we went for a little drive. Coming out of the trail to camp we made a left towards Bake Oven. We were surprised that the Bake Oven dune is not really a dune at all and more of a packed surface. There are a few spur trails that dead in at the various properties that still exist in the area. We got back on the main trail that should go to Bake Oven and the Wilderness boundary. Somehow, when the wilderness was enacted it cut the road off that used to continue on and connect with the Sherman Pass Jeep trail. Must have just been an oversight.

The trail to Bake Oven crosses a rock bridge and then heads up into the trees. This was the first taste of real narrow trail. A few spots were a bit worrisome, but not overly bad. There was a few rocky sections as well, but nothing too bad. Unfortunately we didn't make it all that far before hitting a road block.


So with no chainsaw and with no clean bypass we were forced to turn around and head back down the way we came up. The kids wanted to drive a bit so once we got out of the trees and on the other side of the dune I gave the wheel over to my daughter. We set out toward Monache taking the left that runs up to the Kern river crossing. After a little bit I let my son take over driving and we crossed the river and continued making rights which took us all the way around to the sandy beach crossing right were the trail comes out from Monache Jeep Trail. I took back over and drove us back to camp.



We got back to camp in time to cook some dinner as the sun went down.

 

[KSL22]

This is from Friday night. We did catch the meteor shower on Thursday night which was amazing. we didn't know it was happening so it was a great surprise to see start as we were trying to track satellites. One of these days I will have to get a real camera. I love my Lumix TS-25 for it's dust proof water proof nature but it is still a pocket camera trying to pretend it is a DSLR.

Saturday morning I woke up early and made coffee. Since i was up way before the kids I decided to hike the hill behind camp and watch the sun crest the valley from a nice boulder perch. It really is a amazing valley. I can't wait for the water to return and bring it back to it's full glory.


I couldn't resist taking a few more of the river across from camp.


After the kids woke up and we made breakfast, we made a plan to try and get a spot on the South Fork of the Kern. I wanted them to be able to play in some real water and I secretly wanted to explore more. So we packed up the truck and headed back out up to Sherman Pass Road.

I stopped to capture some of the trail coming up Monache Jeep Trail as I pretty much was in "get to camp" mode on the way down. We got behind two guys on big adventure bikes. I had to stop and help the guy on the BMW a few times as he was not a experienced dirt rider. That and the fact that they were on 95% street tread didn't help either.


Here is the one hard optional line on the trail of the granite boulder.


And a little further up the trail is this little uphil rock garden.

 

[KSL22]

We exited the trail and headed back down Fish Creek rd towards Sherman Pass rd. We took Sherman Pass rd north towards Kernville. We took our time on the road as I didn't want to air back up from the ~ 25 psig for the few miles to the next trail head. We turned right of the blacktop at forest route 22S41. This is a fun graded road with some good sweeping turns and some rolling water bars thrown in for good measure. You still need to be cautious as a motorcycle trail crosses the road a few times before you get to the Sherman Pass Jeep trail head.

Speaking of motorcycles, on your way to the trail head you pass one of my favorite places to camp with the trailer at Bonita Meadows. There is a lot of fun technical single track up on the Kern Plateau. You just have to like skinny single track on the side of mountains and lots of rocks.

It only gets more exciting from here.
View attachment 364080

Once we started down the trail it became evident that spacial awareness was going to be real important. Trying to get a 20' long vehicle lined up to tree openings barely wider than the sheet metal takes a little planning on when you start your turns.
One of the tight squeezes.



The trail has a few rocky spots, some tougher than others. A little ways in we came up to a downed tree with a by pass on the uphill side of the trail. At this point I didn't know if I was going to be able to make it through the rest of the trail. The climb off trail was loose and off camber with a hard right around a tree. There were two paths back down to the trail. One was tight with out rocks and the other was less tight with larger rocks. There was no way I could get lined up to shoot between the trees on the "easy path" which left the less easy path.

The less easy path meant a tight right back don the slope with a tight 90° right at the bottom to get back on the trail. The big issue besides keeping sheet metal off the trees was there was three larger rocks on the slope that I also had to navigate in the tight space. I was slightly worried about frame contact on the rock my drivers front had to drop off of, but it cleared. I did diff my rear on one of the rocks and had to jockey it a bit to get it to clear. This put me real close to putting the passenger door into a tree, but it got clear and I was on my way.

One of the other spots my diff magnet was working like a charm. Took a few try's to find the right line.


Choose your own adventure mini rock garden.


About half way through the trail splits with a steep and very rocky hill on the left or a less steep but still somewhat rocky hill on the right. I took the harder looking line up to the top partly because there was a group of 15-18 rigs parked off to the side and I didn't want to look chicken. The truck went right up thankfully. Just past the top of the hill the trail breaks off and if you go left there is a trail that takes you to Sherman Pass peak as well as a trail that will take you to Embree cabins and some mining relics and then down to Sherman Pass road. If you are in a big vehicle and enjoy your paint, this is the route to pick. I am dumb so I continued on.

The views are worth some scratches and dents right.....


Past the turn off the trail starts dropping in elevation and the brush on either side of the trail gets real close. It was basically like a mike of constant screeching as the sticks rubbed down the sides of my truck. There is a small stream crossing and then it really starts dropping elevation. And then the switch backs start. I had to multi-point three or four of them to make it around. On the down side of most of them was a little rock shelf to drop down. Sorry that I didn't stop to capture the excitement but I was on edge and just trying to make it to the bottom at this point.

Airing back up at the highway. Three out of four Method wheel centers do not think that this trail was wide enough. Also found two new small dents on the drivers side which I didn't remember feel happen.

 

[KSL22]

From here we went down to the Kern and looked for a spot at one of the campgrounds. I finally found one at Fair View after initially passing it up. Lesson learned is that you always ask the camp host about vacancies even if the sign says full. I set up the tent while the kids played in the water. After everything was set up we went down to McNalley's and grabbed some dinner. They make are somewhat famous for their Porterhouse steaks. I got the 24oz and it was fantastic. The kids meal burger that my son ordered was fantastic as well.

The next morning we packed up and headed home. I tied to talk the twins into one more adventure but they were done and wanted to get home to mom, sister, and dog.

 

[EMrider]

Great report. That is one of my favorite areas to explore. We were up in Monache three weeks ago and for two nights had the place to ourselves. Did the trail in the van and there were some very tight spots.

R