Old Ephraim was the last and said to be largest grizzly bear in Utah (as far as anyone knows). The grizzly allegedly did quite a bit of damage to sheep herds and after 10 years of tracking, Frank Clark shot him on August 22, 1923. At the time of his death he stood almost 10 feet tall and weighed 1100 pounds. From camp we rode our bikes up/out to his grave site and then more. Our ride was 14.7 miles with 2665’ of climbing.
We rode the gravel Temple Fork Road all the way up to the split with Trail 056 and rode that further into nowhere until we reached Ephraim’s grave. The entire ride was beautiful with aspen, fir, green everything, and flowers. This is a very rough road and we were able to ride there in the same speed it took some little suv to get there. A car would never make it. The grave is marked by a tall granite monument, as tall as the bear was and we snapped a picture before heading on our ride.
After backtracking a short distance we turned onto Old Ephraims trail and climbed a series of primitive switchbacks up and traversed along the hillside. This section of trail doesn’t get much use and is VERY narrow and a bit overgrown. Once we got to the very top we had outstanding views of Logan Valley. This is a black diamond rated trail and I’d agree. Going the way we rode it, from east to west is the best and was all rideble but from the top down is pretty technical with lots of tricky rock gardens. I can’t say I’d recommend riding it in the opposite direction.
At the bottom of Old Ephraim’s we turned right and rode up Willow Creek Trail and on to Temple Fork Road to get back to camp. This was a great loop with a mix of gravel, rough dirt, and singletrack that allowed us to cover more new territory and see a historic site. Another great day!
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