Trails in New Mexico, Wyoming, Montana.Idaho

[Chotchy]

hey guys. i'm looking for any trails that are or near the Continental Divide in these states. I have plenty of them for Colorado. I also ordered lots of maps from various parks around the Divide. Just wanted to see if anyone had some ideas.
TIA

 

[jb welda]

well when youre up on the beartooth pass near cooke city wyoming/montana (the state line runs down the middle of the street) go to the bike shack in cooke city and ask for bill. tell him you want to know of some trails and he will point them out to you. tell him jah bill from sacramento said hello while youre at it!

there are a bunch of trails off what i think is called the chief joseph hiway between cody wyoming and cooke city. one ive been on was leading from the hwy down to clarkes fork river. i was in a rented suv at the time though and it started getting off camber enough that i chickened out and turned around. i bet with my current vehicle (and off road driving experience) it would be a breeze though...

anywhere in the area is simply spectacular scenery!

another place is to go down to echo park on the colorado side of dinosaur national monument and then drive from there (actually the cutoff is about 3 miles before echo park proper) to browns park home of butch cassidy and the sundance kid. TOTALLY beautiful canyon country there and plan on spending the night at echo park. if its not prime season you probably wont see anyone around.

one love
jah bill

 

[Chotchy]

thanks for the tip. ill definitely look bill up when i get out there.

 

[brew8]

There are several roads and trails around Cooke City, just out side of town at the clarks fork trail head is the goose lake road it's a nice drive daisy Pass is right off of there, farther down the high way is the Morrison Jeep trail, it's closed across the plateau till the 19th of July it crosses over at about 12,500 feet the drops down ito the Clarks fork canyon, the lower end is quite formidible it drops 3000 feet in just a few miles and has 27 switch backs, may of which you can just pull in and back down to the next in several areas the is only 20 0r thirty feet between the switch backs, definatly not for the faint of heart, there are a number of trails around Rawlins Wyoming that are quite nice as well just talk to the folks in the local gas stations and they will tell you where to go,( sorry for the pun ), Hope this helps, Larry

 

[Chotchy]

thanks larry for the suggestion. i will definitely take that route. i will be traveling there around august 10th

 

[brew8]

pic's of the trail

Here are a few pictures of the trail, cheers, Larry

 

[brew8]

a few more

a few more

 

[tclndcrz]

heyy just saw this thread. a few buddies and i were planning on checking out the trails near cooke city when school starts back up. would you be interested in going again? any more pictures?

 

[brew8]

let me know when your going

Here are some Pic's of Benbow trail

 

[brew8]

more

here are a few more

 

[Chotchy]

those trails look sweet. how difficult are they?

 

[brew8]

You will need 33 inch tires but open diffs are fine, mostly ruts and rocks, not to bad in august there is no snow, but there may be a lot before the middle of July and after the end of August, but I have been there till the middle of October, Larry

 

[jb welda]

>You will need 33 inch tires

when you say this, what does it mean exactly. i run 31s (still) so i assume that my ground clearance would be approx 1 inch less than with 33s. is that the crux of the issue? or is there something inherently better about 33s other than the 1 inch (less i would assume if aired down) clearance they give you?

my problem: just bought 3 new 31" spare tires and dont want to retire all 7 without them getting at least a LITTLE wear. i realize my error now but what can you do?

one love
jah bill

 

[brew8]

I used to run these trails with 31's i'm one of those that always starts at the low end, I used to drag the diffs a lot and get hung up easily in the spring snow drifts, I went to 33 inch tires much better I now run 35's and I think next time bigger, I hardly ever drag a diff and the water crossings are much better with the tall tires, cheers, Larry