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Last weekend we went up camping at Pyramid Lake, Echo Lake, and the surrounding area in the Uintas in Utah. We were unfortunately just past peak fall colors at that elevation, but it was still very pretty!
Murdock basin road is a rather rough forest service road, with a few decent-sized rock ledges. It's rated a 4 on OnX, but it's probably closer to a 3. It's an easy trail if you have very high clearance (12" or more), but can be quite tough in the sport. It's not especially hard and you're not going to roll off a cliff from a bad line, but it's _very_ rocky. In the sport, that means choosing lines carefully in things you'd just bounce across in something with more clearance. It's honestly quite a fun trail to drive in the sport. We also had our "big" bronco with us as well, mostly just so we could be very lazy with packing gear.
I didn't take any photos on the way in on Friday because we were trying to push to make it to camp on the early side and get a good spot. It had rained relatively recently and there was a relatively low fire risk, so we had a very nice campfire. We didn't get the exact spot we were hoping for, but still, camp was quite nice:
It's a really spectacular area, so I can't resist posting a few pictures of scenery:
While I didn't take any photos on the way in, I was sure to take a few on the way out to be able to show the sport on the trail:
Unfortunately, on the way out, we noticed rapidly increasing smoke from a fire. We'd seen a very small fire in the distance on the previous day (Saturday) and folks responding to it, but on Sunday, it exploded while we were driving out. That's the Yellow Lake Fire, which has grown 10x since then and is still spreading. It looks like it's now burned the entire area around another favorite trail of mine in the Soapstone area, sadly. Hopefully, the weather will help soon, but it's very rough terrain.
If you're in the Salt Lake area, Murdock Basin Rd is well worth the drive over to check out. The first half is quite smooth and no issue for anything, but it gets progressively rougher as you go back.
Murdock basin is a challenge in the sport, but it will happily make it up there everywhere except a few side trails and a few especially rough lake access points (which are technically not supposed to be driven to). I'd skip the last 100 yards to Echo Lake or Marshall Lake or Hoover Lake, but you can get almost right to them. There are just some mudholes with hidden rocks in them in the first two that I'd be cautious about in the sport, and Hoover lake has a legit rock garden to get the last 100 yards up to it that the sport would never make (though again, the trail ends before that on the MVUM, so you're not supposed to drive up to it anyway). Overall, the trail is enough of a challenge in the sport that I'd hesitate to recommend doing it solo unless you know the trail. You can definitely high center yourself on rocks if you pick a poor line. Regardless, it's the type of trail the sport was made for. It's a lot of fun, and it's absolutely gorgeous!
Murdock basin road is a rather rough forest service road, with a few decent-sized rock ledges. It's rated a 4 on OnX, but it's probably closer to a 3. It's an easy trail if you have very high clearance (12" or more), but can be quite tough in the sport. It's not especially hard and you're not going to roll off a cliff from a bad line, but it's _very_ rocky. In the sport, that means choosing lines carefully in things you'd just bounce across in something with more clearance. It's honestly quite a fun trail to drive in the sport. We also had our "big" bronco with us as well, mostly just so we could be very lazy with packing gear.
I didn't take any photos on the way in on Friday because we were trying to push to make it to camp on the early side and get a good spot. It had rained relatively recently and there was a relatively low fire risk, so we had a very nice campfire. We didn't get the exact spot we were hoping for, but still, camp was quite nice:
It's a really spectacular area, so I can't resist posting a few pictures of scenery:
While I didn't take any photos on the way in, I was sure to take a few on the way out to be able to show the sport on the trail:
Unfortunately, on the way out, we noticed rapidly increasing smoke from a fire. We'd seen a very small fire in the distance on the previous day (Saturday) and folks responding to it, but on Sunday, it exploded while we were driving out. That's the Yellow Lake Fire, which has grown 10x since then and is still spreading. It looks like it's now burned the entire area around another favorite trail of mine in the Soapstone area, sadly. Hopefully, the weather will help soon, but it's very rough terrain.
If you're in the Salt Lake area, Murdock Basin Rd is well worth the drive over to check out. The first half is quite smooth and no issue for anything, but it gets progressively rougher as you go back.
Murdock basin is a challenge in the sport, but it will happily make it up there everywhere except a few side trails and a few especially rough lake access points (which are technically not supposed to be driven to). I'd skip the last 100 yards to Echo Lake or Marshall Lake or Hoover Lake, but you can get almost right to them. There are just some mudholes with hidden rocks in them in the first two that I'd be cautious about in the sport, and Hoover lake has a legit rock garden to get the last 100 yards up to it that the sport would never make (though again, the trail ends before that on the MVUM, so you're not supposed to drive up to it anyway). Overall, the trail is enough of a challenge in the sport that I'd hesitate to recommend doing it solo unless you know the trail. You can definitely high center yourself on rocks if you pick a poor line. Regardless, it's the type of trail the sport was made for. It's a lot of fun, and it's absolutely gorgeous!
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