Mystery Campground (Twisp)

Yes that is the name of the campground and the town. I always think of candy bars when I think of the town name for some reason. I decided to check out these phenomally cheap campsites before I bought into them. Firsth thing in the morning, without packing up my tent, I left the Winthrop KOA and drove 15 miles back to Twisp then 15 more niles to a $6 campground. It was OK. It was right on the Twisp river. There were only 8 sites and about half were full. I drove 4 more miles and found a quaint little campground right on the river. There were only 4 sites and the price was $3. The only drawback was there was not water or garbage service. A deer walking through campsite #3 was the only sign of life I saw. It felt right. I headed back the KOA to retrieve my tent, stopping in Twisp for gas and firewood and Winthrop for food. On the way back to the campsite I took an alternate route down a gravel road to get an idea of the trailhead locations. On the way I saw a bunch of angry looking men walking along the side of the raod followed by a white van. The men wore long sleeve shirts and trousers with broad black and white horizontal stripes. The van had a sherrif insignia on the side of the door. I assumed the men were picking up trash and did not seemed to please to be doing so on a very seldom travelled dusty gravel road. By 11:30 am I had camp set up and by 1 pm I was on my bike looking for a bike trail. I travelled east to the Slate Creek trail looking for the Twisp River Trail junction. the Twisp River Trail according to my map was open to bike. I found both trails but only the junction that went east. I rode west for about 4 miles to Scatter Creek Trail head passing another $6 campground. This time I found both sides of the Twisp River Trail Junction. It was a very warm sunny day. I had purposely wore my hiking boots and brought my hiking hat and plenty of water in case I wanted to turn my adventure into a Hike and Bike. According to my crudely drawn map Scatter Creek trail led to Scatter lake and looked to be the shortest of similar trails joining the Twisp River Trail. It like the others was open to hikers and horses only. I decided to give it a shot not knowing how long the trail was or its difficulty. It was 2:30pm and I estimated the trail to be roughly 2 and a half miles. I hoped I could be back by 4 pm to ride down the Twisp River trail. I immediately nopticed the steepness of the trail and the lack of switchbacks. I was sweating profusely after only a few minutes. No bother. I had been on trails like this before, they try and scare you a little at first then even things out for a while then make you earn your reward of some glorious sight towards the end. I wish. After 2 hours of struggling up long steep hills with no breaks and sometimes going straight up the hill, I quit. I can't remember ever quitting a trail, but this one kicked my behind. I cursed the morons who built the trail for the last half hour at least. Having taken a one day seminar on trail building, I did not consider myself an expert but I saw a lot of classic mistakes on this trail. One goal we learned is if the trail is for general use to shoot for an average grade of 8%. This goal is usually not met but if you shoot for it you can end up in the 10 to 12% range. I would estimate this trail to be at least twice that range. If you are not going to make the trail for general use, why spend all the effort to build it. I could see a lot of effort went into this trail and what the register showed was 2 to 3 people using the trail per week for the last month. Not suprisingly, I made it back to the trailhead in 45 minutes (that compared to the 2 hours up is a substantial difference). I found a man and woman next to the trailhead sitting on chaise lounges next to a pickup and camper and eating sunflower seeds. I told them of the steepness of the trail and we exchanged stories of other trailos, neither listening to the other's story. One interesting thing I noticed on the trail was that it had the same type of wildflowers as those in Glacier National Park. I decided I was too tired to explore the bike trail so rode my bike back down the road I came to camp.During the whole ride all I could think of was soaking my feet and cooling off in the Twisp River about 50 feet from my campsite. Thats exactly what I did. The river was very cold and very swift but I managed to wade out to my knees and take a Marine shower. I felt good. It was 7pm I ate a dinner of summer sausage and Ritz crackers then propped my feet up on the picnic table and continued reading my book. By 8pm I was too tired to read anymore so retired to my tent. Then the traffic started. About 4 vehicles in all pulled into the campground, some stopping at the pay statio and some not, but all continued on their way. I read some more and thought about whether I should stay another night. I also thought about the prisoners and how there must be something more useful than trying to find littler on an old abandoned road that no one uses. Rather than rehabilitate, this to me would reinforce the ideas that there is no reason to be part of society if this is what society deems appropriate. Suprisingly my fear of camping alone was not present. I felt comfortable and tomorrow was another day I would have to decide where to stay.

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