April 29 – May 1 Doug A shared a route with me; kennedy, “want to do this?” It is always more fun to say yes. The dates were floated, then set, then set again, first May 1-5, then April 29-May 2. Something about that route looked very familiar. It is amazing technology to be able to look at a route then que up the heatmaps; global, personal rides, and personal routes, and see exactly what has overlap and what is novel. But something was missing. I had ridden out of Mill City, the same start as this route, but wasn’t seeing my track. I had a loop out of Dun Glen and it passed the entrance to Star City. I found the record on my STRAVA archives and imported it into Ride with GPS. Now I could see my past three routes that overlapped with kennedy; Mill City Loop, Tobin Peak in High Roads Project 2020, and Augusta Mountain Loop – Riding into Deep Time. But a lot of time had passed between Mill City, Tobin Peak and now so what was old is new again.
The plan was to meet Doug at 10 am. I left with plenty of time to arrive by 9:30 but traffic between Reno and USA Parkway, a distance of 10 miles, had me over an hour late. I was frustrated but no worries we were pedaling up Willow Creek Ranch Rd before 11.
Day 1 Willow Creek/Spaulding Canyon to Klondike Pass and Sulphur Canyon We were riding in the East Range with the Humboldt Range (Star Peak, 9840’) behind us. The lion’s share of climbing is the first 13 miles of the day. We are riding through primo open range grassland with a flowing creek. We summitted above the bowl containing the Willow Creek Mining District. The district is known for its historic placer and lode gold mining. Then we turned south to Klondike Pass and onto private property with an open road at Sulphur Canyon. I noticed we were passing through a Utah juniper forest without the accompanying Single Leaf pinyon. We found a place to camp in Sulphur Canyon that we didn’t realize was claimed by a local bull. We had to shoe it off twice, once in the late afternoon and again at 2 in the morning. There was a little nameless stream in camp but we had our eyes set on another spring for the next day’s water source. Doug had a new tent, the Star Trail Ext 1-Person by Naturehike. It is semi-freestanding, ultralight, with side entry, at a price that won’t break the bank. Doug has plenty of tent experience, is critical of the products available, and has realistic criteria for a bikepacking tent. I value his judgement. He set it up without swearing so that is a good sign. By the numbers: 24.4 miles, 4040’ of climbing, about 5 1/2 hours.
Day 2 Sulphur Canyon to the Devils Elbow to Goldbanks Hills to Pleasant Valley over the Tobin Range to Jersey Valley This was one of those magical days, 3440’ of climbing, so plenty tired, but 5340’ of descending, still tired, but you cover more than twice the mileage of the day before (and almost twice the duration). We refilled our water bottles directly from a plumbed spring (probably should have filtered it). We had lunch at, and poked around the Quicksilver Mines. This is part of the Goldbanks Mining District a historic turn of the century source for mercury and later low grade gold deposits. We passed through the Tobin Range at Golconda Canyon which has ranch property operated by the Vesco Ranch. The Vesco Ranch property also has a historic school house that Doug noticed on the map. But we decided it was best not to show up at the ranch house unexpected. I had fond memories of Golconda Canyon from my Mt Tobin trip.
Out of the canyon we entered Jersey Valley, home to Ormat’s Jersey Valley 15 MW power plant (sometimes indicated as a 10 MW power plant) selling power to NV Energy with a 20 year agreement. Within 3-5 years of the plant coming on line the Jersey Valley Hot Spring had diminished flow, and mitigation efforts by Ormat restored an artificial pool with water from the plant. We chose not to resupply our water from it. A little further south we came to the north end of Augusta Mountains. We branched to the west of my Deep Time route and found a place to camp. Another power plant tidbit, I was talking to a geothermal geologist familiar with the Jersey Valley power plant and he said it was only producing 5-10 MW at best, another example of Ormat’s overpromise and under-performance.
There was very little cover and it was hot in the Jersey Wash! But here we were, camped at 3880’, located below the beautiful Cain Mountain, 8409’ in the Augusta Mountains. By the numbers: 49.8 miles, 3440’ of climbing over a 9 hour day. Kinda perfect!
Day 3 Jersey Valley Wash around the bottom of the Tobin Range through the Sou Hills to the bottom of Pleasant Valley back over the East Range returning to Dun Glen Flat via Buena Vista Valley Day Three became Days 3 and 4 combined without a Herculean effort beyond the Sisyphean climb of Kennedy and Gold Note Canyons. Nothing like mixing your Greek mythology metaphors. Leaving Jersey Valley Wash we were very close to Sou Hot Springs and Seven Devils Springs from the Bolivia Loop. The climb came after visiting the Kennedy Mine which produced gold, copper, lead and silver. A big attraction were the large leaching vats. We didn’t spend too much time, we had our bikes to push up a sustained 20-25% grade.
But man, that descent: 9 miles, 2500’, -5% average grade. It was a blast! We rode right into the hot air and direct sun of Buena Vista Valley. It was too hot to comfortably stop and camp. We passed Kyles Hot Spring but it wasn’t on Doug’s radar and I didn’t mention it. I was thinking about getting a burrito in Fernley. We passed Unionville and Star City with an easy paved and downhill finish to Willow Creek Ranch Road.
By the numbers: 61.4 miles, 4400’ of climbing over a 10 hour day.
The Kennedy Loop by the numbers: 136 miles with 11,900’ of climbing. Is there anything I would change? Not with Days 1 or 2. Possibly plan on Day 3 ending at Kyles Hot Spring. For Day 4 add in Unionville and Star City for historic interests.
Connecting the Dots With this route in addition to the other personal heatmaps I can now envision a route from Denio (Oregon border) to south of Beatty and then proposing a route from there to Kingman, AZ. A north-south route is close to becoming a reality. But is it the best north-south route? Probably not.
And the burrito you ask? We stopped at Guadalajara Grill in Fernley. I stuck to my usual, the Al Pastor Big Burrito but Doug ordered better by getting the Relleno Burrito. Definitely my next order. You can see the restaurant on the Loneliest Burrito.
For another perspective check out Doug’s blog. Always a good write-up.
If you missed it, my June 2026 newsletter on Substack is here.