With the typical strong wind out of the south, amplified by that atmospheric river hitting California, we started out with a tailwind, hoping that the wind would be less adjacent to the fault block side of Hart Mountain. Also, I didn't know what would go through on the east side of Hart lake.
There are almost no cars on the road here, perhaps a couple of pick ups from time to time. Reaching the northeast corner of Hart lake (actually a field these days), we turned onto a fish and game road. It is basically double track and very well packed such that there wasn't much softness to the dirt. Anywhere off the road though was quite soft from the recent snow and rain.
I noticed some large boulders, rolled ahead and turned around to take a video of my partner riding between the stones. As she entered them, she stopped and said, "Look at the petroglyphs." I hadn't even noticed. We hopped off the bikes and walked around through a veritable art gallery of Nüümü rock art.
It was time to search for the bridge that I could see on the map.
I had in mind to do a loop around Hart Lake by crossing at Stone Bridge, but it was difficult to find said stone bridge. Stone bridge apparently was a crossing put in by the military placing basalt boulders across the river in the 1860s to move their camp across to the west side.
I had a few back up plans as even though trails/roads seem to go through on a map like Gaiagps, I’m never certain if these roads will be open and I had concerns that would be true on the west side roads which cross private lands.
I hunted a bit for the bridge in the middle of a cattle herd, but the stones weren't easy to find. So, rather than a circumnavigation, we turned around and backtracked.
There was now a light tail wind along the double track, which turned into a strong headwind as we rounded the north end of Hart lake. It was quite a grind back into Plush.
All around, the mountains were still white from yesterday's snowstorm.