Upper 1/3 of Lake Isabel Trail is GONE (photos)

[lupinsea]

Spent Saturday up at Reiter doing some wheel'n. Had a chance to check out the Lake Isabel Trail. Wow! Unbelievable. The upper third of the trail is basically non-existent anymore. From about 700-800 ft below the log bridge on up it's gone. The log bridge is also gone, either washed out or in part burried under about 10 ft of debris. This debris pile diverted May Creek down the trail scouring that out.

The flip side, the rock buggies should have fun.










http://homepage.mac.com/jgreening/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2008-04-30%2001.49.17%20-0700/Image-754C6EAA169111DD.jpg
This is about 100 ft from the 2 ft rock ledge, if anyone remembers that. The ledge
that's about 800 ft or so down from the upper log bridge. The rock ledge itself is burried
under debris that has washed down the trail.





http://homepage.mac.com/jgreening/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2008-04-30%2001.49.17%20-0700/Image-754CE19F169111DD.jpg
Here's the lake isabel trail as it is now. It's 4-5 ft lower than it used to be and this is
the part of the trail that is in the last 700 ft before reaching the upper log bridge. It
used to have some small basket-ball size rocks but otherwise was a decent road bed.
Nothing like this.






http://homepage.mac.com/jgreening/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2008-04-30%2001.49.17%20-0700/Image-754CFA44169111DD.jpg
More of the Lake Isabel trail just before the log bridge. There used to NOT be a creek here.







http://homepage.mac.com/jgreening/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2008-04-30%2001.49.17%20-0700/Image-754D1329169111DD.jpg
Still about 600 ft from the log bridge on the down-hill side of it. As you can see, the trail is gone.

[lupinsea]

http://homepage.mac.com/jgreening/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2008-04-30%2001.49.17%20-0700/Image-754D59BC169111DD.jpg
This was as far as we got, about 400-500 ft from the log bridge.
Then everything stopped and just got worse. There was a more pronounced
creek and it basically turned into a river.






http://homepage.mac.com/jgreening/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2008-04-30%2001.49.17%20-0700/Image-754D88C8169111DD.jpg
That one log is the remains of the log bridge. I drew in with white lines where the rest of the bridge
would have been as well as two lines showing where the trail was.






http://homepage.mac.com/jgreening/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2008-04-30%2001.49.17%20-0700/Image-754DA04B169111DD.jpg
The log bridge is burried under 8-10 ft of debris which diverted May Creek down the trail. This
shot was from the otherside of the bridge where the trail took a sharp 90* left and
continued up the rock wash.





http://homepage.mac.com/jgreening/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2008-04-30%2001.49.17%20-0700/Image-754DB8E2169111DD.jpg
This is about 200 ft up the trail from where the log bridge used to be. What used to be a narrow Jeep
trail is about a 100 ft wide gash in the forest. The fellow on the left is to give scale and he's pointing
in the direction of the trail.

[jobless]

Looks like a good time to me :)

[big_MARK]

Looks like a good time to me :)

You know...I was thinking the same thing. :D

[Kat JK]

X2 I want to lead to see how far i can get.

[Kat JK]

more Issabelle,

http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff229/JKkat/100_2017.jpg
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff229/JKkat/100_2015.jpg
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff229/JKkat/100_2020.jpg

[mark]

Looks like the trail just got alot better.


Anyway to get past were the bridge "used" to be? The upper part looks fun as well.

[big_MARK]

As of Saturday driving to the old log bridge is a no-go.

Maybe a Buggy WOT can get up the waterfall but I even doubt that.

Looks like nature makes another score ;) against us.