Redbird Crest trails, Daniel Boone National Forest, Kentucky

[Chuck78]

Does anyone here ever ride the Redbird Crest / Elisha Creek / Gilbert Creek trail system in Daniel Boone National Forest's Red Bird Ranger District in the southeastern reaches of Kentucky?

Yours truly, last July 4th, 2022, after running an unmarked trail off of trail 4 near Sugar Creek Trailhead, that takes you to the top of Lucindas Lookout Tower Rd where there are a few really nice graveled campsites 1.6 miles ride from the Sugar Creek Trailhead (where there's a trailhead vault toilet available, )

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Here's a dreamy picture of some of the official single track riding to be had:

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This is the favorite roadside camp spot on Sugar Creek Rd at what the locals call Old Woman's Rock, looking from fire pit towards the road:

same spot but looking from the tent/road side back towards the forest where there's a small creek behind the campsite:


Here's a KDX200 video from Sugar Creek Rd onto Redbird Crest #801 trail section 4, and onto some unofficial singletracks, down to the lower section of Sugar Creek Rd at Peter's Branch Rd:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17CvIFYy93U

So many of the videos on YouTube just show a lot of faster easier sections, but I swear there are TONS of steep rocky technical sections here on the official trails, all over the place... I think a lot of video creators just post only the sections where the had no difficulty

Trail 1, not far from the gravel access road entry into the forest:

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Trail section 1 climbs nonstop, sidehilling up a steep, gorgeous, and rugged ravine up about 575 feet of elevation all in one shot...

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Trail 6B right off of trail section 6:

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[Chuck78]

Trail Section 11, the well known and easily recognized powerline clearcut vista:

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This place has some amazing a fairly rugged trails to offer that we've found to be some of the best kept secrets in the Eastern USA for intermediate enduro riding, with some pretty challenging rocky climbs and singletracks as well. There's well over 150 miles of riding to be done here in this very remote National Forest area, with a 69 mile outer loop currently, 22 trail sections of the Redbird Crest Trail #801. Sections 14-15 are road connectors currently, but they will be re-routing the beginning/end of the official singletrack trails midway into trail section 16 and connecting it to the end of trail 13 in the near future with primarily singletrack sections, and a mile or two on old oil/gas access roads.
There's 30 more miles on trail sections 5A, 6A, 6B, and 7A which intersect the 69 mile Trail 801 outer loop at trail sections 4/5 junction and trail 6, as well as Peters Branch Rd (4wd road that's mostly just another nice dirt/rocky trail aside from a mile of gravel up to Peters Branch Cemetery), Gilbert Creek Rd or Gilberts Creek Rd depending on which map you look at, and Big Creek Rd (another 4wd road that's just another nice trail to run basically).

Section 12 or 11?:

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Sections 6A and 7A are the only somewhat beginner-friendly trails there, with 1,2,3,4, and 5B being a lot of beginner friendly stuff but several areas of rocky steep climbs. Trail section 7 now should be pretty beginner friendly, as I believe they've finally cleared it of many continual tree blockages that have plagued it for over 2 years now. It's a sidehill trail cut in just downwind from a north-south running tall ridge with a lot of big old trees on some very steep terrain, and suffers a lot of big old tree blow-downs. I believe they are going to eventually re-route that whole trail off of trail 7A, on the other side of the ridge it runs below now, to avoid the blow downs. They ran a mini dozer through there to move some of the big tree trunks out, so it should be easier now since the work in progress when we were there in mid March 2023.


Trail Section 11 rock gardens:

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I wouldn't recommend camping at the Bear Creek Trailhead on the south end (neither do the Rangers, and don't leave anything out and unlocked down there either), but WOW, some of the best hard enduro technical rocky steep trails are accessed off of the Bear Creek Trailhead. heading across the road on 12>11>10>9 will take you to some intensely steep climbs with several rock garden sections, and some amazing and easier ridge running sections up high. Not for the meak, on our 3 day trip, the first 45 minutes of riding for us in 2023 were making it up the first mile of trail, and it took many tries for my buddy to even get 1/4 mile into this section due to the steepness and technical nature immediately out of the trailhead going north trail 12>11... I got to ride that KDX200 many times up the hardest stuff that day, as well as riding the '07 KTM 200 XC-W... My KDX220R was the best suited tool for this terrain by far, especially the way I've got it set up.


There's also free camping, and not even really any mosquitoes, although you should treat your clothes and boots with Permethrin and use DEET or Picaridin to keep the chiggers off of you especially if camping in the forest at some roadside dispersed sites or at the trailheads.
There's a recently reopened RV campground adjacent to the forest directly on US421 that has logging road trails that lead to Redbird Crest/Elisha Creek trail section 6B, as well as 6 RV hookup sites at the Stinnett Area Community Center with just a short ride down a paved road and then a gravel>dirt road to the middle of trail section 6. Both of those places have showers and indoor restrooms, FYI!

Amazing rugged terrain with elevation reliefs of well over 700ft from the creekbeds to the tops of the hills, which for all intents and purposes, a lot of people would call mountains.

[Chuck78]

There's also a massive amount of old abandoned road grades as well as oil/gas well access roads and a couple dozen unmaintained forest service roads and county/township dirt roads in the area that aren't any different than a lot of the official 2-track trails, as well as tons of unofficial single.

old road grade with a singletrack path to some more traditional single:



single:
(not my vid)



Yours truly with my tough, lovely, and talented lady, at a pretty well hidden campsite just across a creek from Sugar Creek Rd, only 40 feet or less from the road but easy to drive past. Parking roadside, Jeep or small 4x4 pickup access and bike access only at the campsite, but lots of parking roadside in the grassy graveled area:

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This hidden but almost roadside campsite is located at GPS coordinates 37.12322, -083.50260 - but...DO NOT try to follow Google Maps GPS there from the west! The maintained gravel road continues North from this campsite along the creek for a while, but Google Maps shows it following a dirt access road from the graveled road at the campsite off to the west/southwest... you can follow the Google Maps directions off of US421 to the Sugar Creek Trailhead and then there to this GPS above 37.12322, -083.50260 and it will get you there. 100 feet down the other road past an oil well tank, what Google displays as Sugar Creek Rd (which it is not past here) turns to rugged dirt 2-track.