Wherever You Are, There You Are: Meandering in Southern Oregon and Northern California - Part 3

The experience over the Pacific Coast Ranges lingered in my mind as the bike danced along the 96 toward Hamburg. While this stretch of road was nice and curvy, it was also more heavily trafficked by the logging trucks that were clearing out the charred trees.  I recalled seeing many trees tagged with various colored ribbons as if they were being selected for removal.  Not knowing much about forestry and land management beyond the basics, and having never really thought about the restorative processes after a fire, this ignited my curiosity - and has since led me down an interesting rabbit hole of reading up on forestry, land management, and the responses and interventions conducted after severe fire events; interventions such as salvage logging.  To put it concisely: trees suffer varying degrees of death and injury from fires which doesn't always mean instant death. Some trees suffer critical injury but survive partially. The scope of tree injury and mortality is assessed over periods of time (sometimes months) following a fire in determining the potential for regrowth and the level of impediment that could be posed by invasive factors such as bark beetles and shrubs that can overtake the environment before trees can reseed and germinate. Trees that are dead or not likely to survive, are logged out. Whether or not humans should intervene at all is a subject of great debate. Some people believe you should just let the forest heal itself.

The knowledge I've gleaned so far is a bit much to expound upon without a major digression in this post, but it will undoubtedly shape my attitudes toward the lands I visit and the way I experience forests from this point forward. It also takes me back to a trip I did last year to the Alabama Hills, where I camped out of Lone Pine and visited the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest during some explorations in the White Mountains (absolutely stunning, by the way).  I was enamored with it then, and my newfound knowledge has only enlightened my fascination and respect for forestry.  This is what I love about getting lost in the world; the way my experiences draw me away from the mundane and challenge me to feed my knowledge.

Charred bark on a tree in Oregon - kinda looks like scabs over fresh skin.

The stretch along the 96 slowly came back to life with greens as I approached my turnoff for a little road toward Scottys Bar.  Scott River road gradually worked its way into a narrow single lane that reminded me of Highway 229 in Santa Margarita; very narrow with ranches and cabin homes lining the path through the mountains. It was narrow enough to have to pull over or back up to allow oncoming traffic to pass.  The KTM flung fairly easily from side to side as I channeled her inner supermoto but our fun was cut a hair short when I caught up to a truck and we spent the remainder of the time chugging along in low gear down the last mile or so of the road left before the 3.