Signal Peak 4x4 trail

Sunday afternoon some friends and I went an hour up the road to run the Signal Peak 4x4 trail out of Cisco Grove, CA. Mike and I had run this trail a couple of years ago and it had some challenging spots, but many of our local trails are impacted and are getting more and more difficult. More on that later. We aired down and started the climb to the top of the mountain.
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The first half mile of the trail is steep and boulder-strewn. If you get stopped, it can be difficult to get moving forward again. On occasion the truck just stops climbing while the tires look for traction, all the while moving the rocks further down the hill toward the guy behind you.
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Most of the obstacles are just series of giant boulders that are placed in the worst locations--usually in the middle of the trail with a strategically placed one just one wheelbase ahead of that one. The trail is mostly used by side-by-sides, so anything wider and you either have to go around them or over them, something easily done in a $100,000 buggy, not a street vehicle. Most of us had rear lockers and they got used quite a bit.
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Mike took on a little damage, but as you can see, he has it all fixed with the addition of a band aid.
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We had to do a little trail maintenance for the next obstacle. There was a boulder too large to climb on the right, with another large boulder that the left tire couldn't climb, resulting in a fully articulated suspension and an easy high-centering. We did a little rock stacking and relocation to get through.
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Unbelievably we got this 2014 Trail Edition through with the running boards intact. These things must be made out of plasti-dip, because at various times I saw them tweaked in every direction and somehow they ended up pretty straight after the trail ride was over. (Sorry Mike, had to steal your pic for that one.)
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The location below was the only part of the trail that had actually gotten easier. There's a natural spring about 150' up the trail, so the rocks and tree roots can be wet, and when combined with the steep drop off on the right side, is a bit nerve-wracking. Thanks to the California drought, this spot was no problem.
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Also in our favor, the steel water pipe that was previously exposed and damn near impossible to climb was finally removed from the trail. It was suspended more than a foot in the air in places, and with wet tires, it took a solid hit and momentum to climb.
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The 5th gens are very large compared to the 3rd gens, but it did really well. It required a little more spotting and the sides of the truck were in the brush more than the narrower 3rd gens. This one was a Trail Edition and had the rear locker, and he actually bought it with a dealer-installed lift.
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We hit an area of the trail that Mike and I had never run. Little did we know that we had taken the bypass and never saw the toughest obstacle. But some asshats that decided they wanted to turn this trail into a dedicated buggy or side-by-side trail dropped three or four trees across the bypass.
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While we were deciding on our next course of action we were approached from behind by four highly built side-by-sides. Each were way taller and way more modded than any side by side I have ever seen. Watching them struggle confirmed that this would be our turn around point. Each of them had to be strapped at the top of the hill to keep them from sliding off the hill. The rock slab was at a high angle and had lots of sand, dirt and gravel over the top, making for a really slick surface.
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With our tails tucked a little between our legs, we made our way back down the hill without incident. We were bummed we didn't make it to the top, but had a great day nonetheless.

Great pics, and looks like a fun day.

No jab at you guys or the rigs, but man what a difference west coast is to east coast, and I have almost forgotten whats its like to wheel with DD rides.

I would love to come out and wheel with some of you left coasters some say. When I can find a cost effective way to get my '84 across country.

The bypass was probably a illegal trail. They get closed in every so often by the 4x4 clubs or the forest service. You guys have to go back some day when you've got the time to finish it out with trail engineering, more mods, or winching from a anchor vehicle above. If you are anything like me this trail will now haunt you lol.

awesome report! Ken you had time to go out and do a bit of wheeling!? you're a lucky man :)

Great trip report! I'm glad to hear the water pipe is gone, that thing was a real pain to get over.

- Matt

We need to get all of you guys up here for a trip.

Matt, have you ever seen the bypass closed? The rock slab does not look do-able in a street vehicle. The top of the obstacle, which you can't see in the photo, is rock slab at a high camber toward the cliff and it's covered in loose material over the top. They couldn't get the side by sides through without strapping all of them to keep them from sliding and rolling off the hill.

I've only run that trail one time, and I don't remember noticing a bypass near the top. So, I'm not sure which way we went. I don't remember anything extremely sketchy near the top so I would guess we took the bypass.

- Matt

This was one of the first trails that Tom (moderator Tdiddy) and I did when we were new. It sounds like the trail has gotten significantly worse since then because we did it in almost completely stock 4runners.

This trail isn't a very long one in distance and with so many multiple day trails on the same mountain it's less traveled. Ken and I did this as part of a day trip a couple of years ago and had very little issue. The trail is all uphill and it's cut into the side of the hill so it catches a lot of the water and snow in the winter. The vast amounts of moisture on the trail have turned it into rock most of the way.

I assume there has been maintenance throughout the years based on the broken and same sized granite rocks in places. Like Ken said this trail has turned into an ATV, SXS and snow mobile trail, which makes sense. All the other trails within a few miles are dedicated rock crawling trails and DD's have no business on them.

I was informed by a local that does maintenance on the trail that the bypass had been blocked by trees. When he told me this I was confused because I never remember a bypass. It turns out the smooth double track "bypass" was so inviting we never noticed the rock slab climb. I had read about it on line and had seen some pictures but at second glance there was no way we'd make it up. The picture above is the slab section. About 75 yards past that was a soft dirt, root filled, waterfall climb.

It was a fun day and I'm glad we made it out. I wanted to get everyone to the top but it wasn't going to happen. I also had to be somewhat careful because I was leaving at sunrise the next morning for a trip to Oregon that ended up being 1300 miles. Lucky for me they were trouble free except for loosing that band aid on a dirt trail along the Rogue River.