So I got this idea that I would head for the lower Owyhee, where German Brown trout have apparently grown to mythically huge proportions since they were planted in the ’90s. (According to the local fly fishing shops’ Web pages, they trundle up and down the stream like water-going Volkswagen buses. Let me assure you that this not the case.) My trusty motorized steed and I would race to Owyhee Lake Campground via the shortest route using Google maps and my own inestimable confidence in my outback riding abilities.
The route winds through breathtakingly beautiful Succor Creek State Park, followed by a perfectly innocuous-looking left-hand turn onto Fisherman’s Road, the name of which evokes a ruddy-faced gentleman carrying a fly rod and wicker creel with a golden retriever pup nipping at his heels as he strolls toward the local brook nibbling on a tuft of wheatgrass while tamping his pipe.
On the contrary, this road is the longest stretch of sickeningly perilous and destructive razor-sharp and enormous lava rocks, ruts, washouts, slants, mud-holes, switchbacks, and dropoffs I have seen in my forty-nine years on this lovely blue planet. About a mile into this sixteen-mile stretch of so-called road, I passed a couple of guys in a pickup coming the other way. Their slack jaws and far-gazing stares should have tipped me off; it was as if they were seeking sweet salvation somewhere over my shoulder. I was too oblivious to take the hint and forged ahead. I found their sixteen-point turnaround about another mile in.
While I managed not to crash, I’ve never had to work so hard at keeping a bike upright for such a long and uninterrupted stretch of slow, clutch-frying riding. A couple of weeks ago I geared down my V-Strom, but my lowest comfortable speed with this setup is still somewhere around eight miles per hour, and that feels like steering a dragon with dental floss on terrain like this. In the end, I was rewarded with a spectacular view of Owyhee Lake. I only had to shoot around the hulks of abandoned vehicles (was that a withered corpse hunched over the wheel of a ’69 International Scout?) so that I could get a reasonable picture
