19 May 2006

Wapiless

*sighs* I didn't quite make it to the Wapi Holes. So far as I can tell, I was within two miles of the parking area...when to continue following the directions would have required me to open a gate that was almost certainly on private property. I looked for a way around, but never found it. There may have been one on an overgrown dirt road, but, alas, it was TOO overgrown for my car, even though Jean Luc's clearance is higher than that of most passenger cars. I may try again sometime, AFTER I get a map of all the backroads in the area. :^) Which will likely be my quest for this afternoon.

I decided to stop at American Falls Reservoir before coming back, and did a bit of wandering over by the dam. I also popped into the Dam Visitor Center. Not much there. The most interesting things were some Native American creation stories they had in one exhibit. Otherwise, it was photographs and newspaper articles about the building/opening/operating of the dam, which doesn't particularly interest me. I was hoping there might be, oh, a free map of the region... (or even one to buy, but there was no one there to buy it from). No such luck. There were a few free maps, but not of the backroads. Mostly of stuff right around the reservoir. Ah well.

Oh, a few notes if anyone else wants to try this: the directions on the web page have a few problems anyway:

Drive 2 1/2 miles north of American Falls [north of WHAT POINT, precisely?] on ID-39, to South Pleasant Valley Road [labelled; easy to find]. Turn left and drive 7 3/4 miles [Yeah? The road ends after 7.5 miles] to Wapi Road [Breling Road, or something like that]. Turn left on this gravel still paved road. After 3/4 miles turn right [paved road goes right; no turning]; after 2 miles to left [same]; after 1/4 mile go right [here the pavement ends, and HERE is Wapi Lane]; after 1 mile turn left [follow gravel road left]; after 1 mile turn right (west) [same]. Drive 1 mile to the end of the gravel [cattle guard, leads to private property]... GET STUCK! Still, I did pretty well, considering how off the directions were in a few places.


3 comments:

John said...

I always like when the directions tell you to go the wrong way down a one-way street, or to turn onto an "unnamed road" that may or may not actually exist.

Qalmlea said...

:^D Yeah... I picked that hike precisely to see if I could find the place. I've got an actual map of the area, now. So I may try again at some point. *shrugs*

John said...

Shell Canyon, a few miles east of Greybull, WY (where I used to live) has some really cool hiking trails.

Shell falls is pretty awesome, too.
(I admit, it was cooler in the late fall, when there were no Forest Service (do they count as park rangers) people around to stop us from climbing down from the obervation area (platform? deck?)).

Side note about Shell:
Dirty Annie's (a restraunt/convenience store/gift shop) has (had?) T-Shirts that show a road sign saying, "End of the world: 10 mi. Shell, WY: 12 miles."