Ben Olson: Forest Service Roads – Last week I set my time machine for the Roaring 20’s”

By BEN OLSON/for The Herald  —  Last week I set my time machine for the Roaring 20’s. Knowing that I would be going back to Prohibition, I brought a roadie with me. I spent the better part of a day cavorting in 1925 to 1929. Actually, I was just traveling a few miles upstream from Westfir on Highway 19, the source of those 4-digit roads that spur off from the Aufderheide Scenic Byway. I first noticed this years ago as I made a return trip on that route from Terwilliger Hot Springs. 

Traveling south, I was going back in time. By the time I got to the bottom of the hill this side of Box Canyon, I was in the 40’s, with thoughts of WW2, followed soon after by the 30’s and dustbowl and depression years. A trip along Fall Creek’s Highway 18 will get you into the previous century.

Trips along the upper Middle Fork, Highway 21, Hills Creek, Highway 23 and Salmon Creek, Highway 24 will take us to a future that we can only imagine. In quite a scenic way, I might add.

How does the Forest Service designate their roads you might ask? There are some generalities, but no concrete rules. Along Forest Service Road 19, all roads turning off will be 4-digit roads beginning with 19. The first road that you can turn off 19, 2 ½ miles from Westfir is 1910. Another 1 ½ miles and you’ll come to 1912. Those 2 roads happen to meet at Windy Gap, where you could get on the 1802 and travel, eventually, to Lowell. Any roads that spur off the four-digit roads will have 2 or 3 digits and will invariably dead end. Except in cases like 576, which will connect you from the paved 1927 to the gravel 1926. Many 4-digit roads turn out to be dead ends, just like the 2- and 3-digit roads.

The only way to tell is to have a proper map that has all the roads included on it. That doesn’t take into consideration whether the road is actually passable. Downed trees, rockslides and washouts occur. Intrepid explorers with big pick-up trucks and powerful chainsaws seem to do almost all the maintenance on most of these forest service roads.

If you do happen upon an intersection with a road that begins with a different 2 digits than the road you’re on, there’s a good chance that road will lead you somewhere. I’ve learned a lot of things the hard way. I’ve had to back up for a half mile looking for a relatively safe place to turn around. I’ve had to exercise discretion, something that I’ve only learned to do later in life. Walking to a place where I could use my cellphone to call a tow truck for the most expensive roadside assistance ever is something I hope to never have to do.

Once in a while, a road actually gets improved. The efforts to fight the wildfires have improved a number of our area roads. Work on the electrical transmitting lines also helped a couple roads get smooth again. Not that I want to see increased traffic on these roads, but I will mention two that I like to drive on once in a while. 5852, which runs on the other side of the river from Oakridge, is much improved over the first few years that I was in the area. 5821, which travels along the north side of the Lookout Point Reservoir, is passable again without having to ease in and out of the immense potholes on the 5 mile stretch from the Buckhead Natural Area to where the railroad bridge crosses the river.

Back in Wisconsin, you could take a passenger car and play “left, right” and drive to the Illinois border in the south, the UP in the north, the Mississippi River to the west or Lake Michigan to the east. You could do this and never drive through a town, and never be on an unpaved road. Out here, “left, right” can still be done, but it takes a little more planning and a lot more time. It certainly feels more like I’m exploring.