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| Hiking | 11.15 Miles |
1,354 AEG |
| | Hiking | 11.15 Miles | 6 Hrs 38 Mns | | 1.96 mph |
| 1,354 ft AEG | 56 Mns Break | | | |
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| no partners | | Parked at Sheeps Crossing and headed down to the water. The trail was relatively easy to follow, but rather wet and muddy given all the recent rains. This is a beautiful section of trail very close to the river. Didn't see any people until after the first fish dam waterfall at 2 miles in. The waterfalls are delightful! As is the hike alongside the creek. Past the waterfalls, we started to see more and more people and lots of dogs. The trail was also even more muddy due to heavy traffic. The trail was somewhat rocky between the waterfalls and the Greer trailhead.
From the government Springs TH in Greer, we walked up to the East Fork trailhead and crossed the river which is quite wide at that point. We did manage to rock hop across. The trail then heads up. It is wide and well maintained with lots of signs at junctions. In contrast to 95A which is overrun with people, we saw no one on East Fork. Upon reaching the the top, we jumped one gate as we were unable to open it. The trail continues on flat across the mesa top. When we hit the four wheel drive road, my hiking buddy was pretty much done hiking  , so we opted to take the 4WD road (as marked on the topo) to shave off some distance as it intersected with the trail later on. There is a game camera strapped to the tree at the Junction of the trail and the 4WD road. We continued on enjoying the solitude and beautiful cool weather. We hit another gate shortly before our intersection back with the east fork trail. We hopped this gate, too, as it was inoperable. We then met with our first set of MANY cows. All the cows are currently on this trail. . I don't mind a few cows, but really, the trail from here on out was overrun with them, which was disappointing. :/. On the 4WD road almost back to the trail, We passed a bunch of cows and a mean looking bull, but we walked by without incident. The cows and calves moved out of our way and over towards the bull. I was done walking on the old road, and I was happy to see the trail again. It is nicer on a single track, of course. Sadly, we went a short distance on the trail before coming across a massive amount of cows. About 50 or more. A few too many for me to feel comfortable walking through. :/. They were right in the area where there is a spring. The spring is unnamed on the map, but it is the spring between developed spring and spruce spring. Given the cow infestation, we sadly detoured off the trail again and back to the 4WD road. It was nearly cow free, but every so often, there would be 15 cows or so, in groups. We did see our only people since the government Springs trail head here, 3 mountain bikers on the road. We continued on hoping to jump back on the trail at the next intersection, but it was not to be.
At the next intersection of trail and 4WD, the trail goes down into the meadow. And... Wait for it... Hundreds of cows!! Alas, we decided to not wade through the cattle, and instead continued on the 4WD road towards the Winn Campground. This is not a 4WD road usable to the public, we did pass a gate to keep cars out of the wilderness closer to road to the Winn Campground. Eventually we dumped out on the road (going to Winn CG) and headed out to connect with the railroad trail. The railroad trail was simply a connector between sheeps crossing/95A trail and the east fork trail/97. The railroad trail is very underwhelming. It is mostly right next to the road. One good thing - no more cows, ha!!
Right next to sheeps crossing we cut out two meanders by taking the road back to the car, as my hiking buddy was beyond done at this point. :/
I enjoyed 95A and would do it again despite the mud, rocks, and congestion. East fork I would do again(and stay on the trail the entire time!!) if I could be sure the area wasn't overrun by cattle. The cows really took a lot out of the experience! . Oh, well! It is never a bad day when you are out hiking!! The area is beautiful with meadows and forests, and the weather was amazing, if a bit hot on the afternoon (85F!). The railroad connector trail is seriously boring, and I would avoid it in the future! |
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Wildflowers Observation Substantial
Lots of wildflowers still, but starting to wane. |
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Route Editor
Route Scout
Route 
she was interested and ok with a early start time! Joe B jumped on board and it was a go 
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. We started on East Fork and crossed the LCR without incident . Headlamps were only needed for another mile. The Aspen in the burn area are up to 15 or 20 ft. now. We heard the first of the Elk bugling in this area and it would continue off and on the rest of the hike. The second half of East Fork is overgrown with grass. The grass was no bother to our legs and Route Scout kept us on trail. We saw our first of many Elk on this section and one Coyote.
). The grassland along with the LCR on the lower section are my favorite on the West Baldy. This was my first time on the section between the crosscut and West Baldy trailhead. We grabbed our cache here, took a break and were ready for our final section.
to see a herd of cow Elk follow a big Bull Elk around with his every move. We saw this several times 
. We finished before dark which was another goal as well 
About a tenth of a mile past the spring on Topo a slow trickle Creek is passed, gotta be the spring
is one of those words. He was on a flower word binge all weekend. I have not seen the wildflowers so dense and so diverse in this area that I can remember since we've been coming back to 2005. Not sure if it's been extra rainy or post-fire recovery - but wildflowers were awesome.
