When I contacted Lynn about the track, he couldn’t find the one he had made. He knew the route, so he made one up in OnX (a GPX app) and sent it to me. I shared this track with the other people on the ride who had machines equipped with Ride Command.

So, here I was leading a ride on a trail I had never ridden before with six machines following me. I have a reputation for leading rides on trails I haven’t pre-ridden, with the possibility of getting lost. Well, not really lost – I have a track that I can always follow back to where I started, but just lost enough so that the people behind me can say that they got lost with Quadman.

With that explanation, seven machines left the Big Mountain Lodge in Ferron and started up the Ferron Canyon Road to find this Green Canyon. As we passed Millsite State Park, we were following Ferron Creek, which feeds Millsite Reservoir. We were starting to gain elevation. It started to rain, and I noticed one of the dips in the road was showing a little runoff.

The route was easy to follow to this point. It was the same road we could have taken to get to Ferron Reservoir, but just before we came to another trail that would have taken us to the Ferron Canyon Overlook, we turned left onto a trail to Wrigley Springs Reservoir. The rain had stopped, and we were enjoying a trail with no dust.

Courtesy Lynn R. Blamires

Just as we passed the reservoir, the track turned off onto a secondary trail. I was confused. I couldn’t find the track on the ground that I could see on Ride Command. I could hear the word going up and down the line: “Are we lost yet?”

“No,” I said, “I just can’t find the trail.”

The response came back: “We are lost, woo-hoo!”

My grandson, Mark, came to my rescue. He showed me that the track would rejoin the trail we were on soon, so I could save face.

As we continued on the main trail, we passed Wrigley Spring that feeds the reservoir. We turned off onto a more fun and challenging track. It was narrow and wound through the trees along a ridge, then dropped down toward Greens Canyon. Soon we reached the end of the trail, where we stopped to take in the overlook.

Courtesy Lynn R. Blamires

We could see why the trail ended. Had we tried to continue, we would have dropped steeply into Muddy Creek at the bottom of Greens Canyon, where there was no trail, and we might not have been able to climb back out. The view down Greens Canyon toward the east into the valley was beautiful, and the mountains around us showed we were deep in the backcountry.

That is when I discovered on my GPS that, in addition to Greens Canyon, there was Scab Hollow. In my little-boy mind, I thought, why would I name this trail “Greens Canyon” when I could call it the “Scab Hollow Trail?” Girls wouldn’t understand.

Naturally, I was curious about that name. A little research revealed that “Scab” is a highly contagious disease caused by parasitic mites that burrow into the skin of sheep, causing severe itching, wool loss, and raw, crusted sores (“scabs”) on the animals. Quarantine areas were established to treat the infected animals in remote valleys or “hollows” – hence, Scab Hollow was used to treat infected sheep. The disease has been eradicated, but the name remains.

We took some pictures, chewed the fat, and headed back. It was an in-and-out ride, but I always enjoy the ride back because the views are different. We finished a 46-mile ride and made it back in time for dinner.

When you go, take plenty of water, keep the rubber side down, and enjoy the mountain trails west of Ferron.

Lynn R. Blamires can be reached at quadmanone@gmail.com.