Dirt Buggers–Doyle Mountain 3/19/2016

Loop – 68 miles
Riders – John , Paul , Chad , Eric

Had a couple of goals on this ride :

1) Help recover a bike that was drowned in the North Fork of Castle Creek last week.
     A father and son didn’t pack any tools and no one in the group had a 4S plug socket .

2) Learn more of the roads , two tracks, single tracks and just generally explore.

3) Unintended consequence – first ride  this year to produce dirt buggers .

Mike , Greg and Ryan left town about an hour before we did. They doubled up on a 4-wheeler and rode a bike
into Savage Crossing , then hiked along Castle Creek to the bike   .

 

 

We took the road into Savage Crossing. It was chilly at road speeds.
Missed a turn but it just meant we got to ride a bit of single track to Savage.

 

 

The creek was running high from the snow melt and recent storms. We crossed  upstream in a spot that
wasn’t as deep. Couldn’t see the bottom. I went first , worried about a square rock in the bottom I didn’t
carry much speed and had to dap .

 

 

 

The saddle above Savage.

Side Hill into Squaw Garden.

 

 

 

When we caught up Mike , Greg and Ryan had already de-watered the bike and were trying to start it.
Eric took a turn kicking and it started .

Beautiful spot an intersection of two canyons .

 

We rode with Ryan back to Savage Crossing . 
Had lunch and made sure the bike got across the creek. Mike and Ryan decided to push it across.

 

After the bike forded the creek we started on our ride.

 

At the bottom of the saddle above Savage there was an old jeep trail that went up to White Horse Reservoir.
You can make your way into Triangle.

 

Paul, Chad and Eric after a deep water crossing, it was deep but not fast.

 

 

Climbing out of Portland Gulch. I had to stop and remove a layer.
We had just crossed paths with a big group that had Sean Robinson , Brian King and Steve Frisbee .

 

Chad after climbing up a greasy tight side hill above the creek , he was happy to be on top.

 

As we climbed out of Portland Gulch onto the road there was a bunch of tracks headed south.
I figured it must be the group we just passed and maybe there was another trail to find.
We followed them but lost the tracks at a watering trough , State Springs .

 

Gamble Gulch on the upper end of WF Birch Creek.

 

 

 

 

Doyle Place

 

 

 

End of the Day

Return to Doyle Mountain 3/12/2016

Loop – 67 miles

Confused Trail Boss – Spode Daddy

Riders – Loyal, Trent , Dan , Jim

I had planned to do a variation of The House that Dirt Built but got confused by the amount of road to
connect the single track and missed Portland Gulch / Squaw Garden , the best legs.

 

 

Poison Creek

 

 

 

 

 

 

Half Moon Pass

Upper end of West Fork Birch Creek.

Lunch stop

We climbed up the hill to use the monoliths as a wind break.
This part of the canyon was a wind tunnel.

 

 

Looking at last months ride – the trail head for Portland Gulch was another mile of so from where I dropped
into the Savage Crossing single track ( the red track ).

 

Above Savage Crossing we discussed riding Portland Gulch/ Squaw Garden the opposite way but decided to ride over Doyle Mountain so Loyal and Dan could split off and head back to the trucks.

 

Hog Pen – the sand is getting deeper the more it dries out.

 

 

 

Weather was moving in by the time I got back to Boise it was raining.

 

I hadn’t ridden this stretch in years took me a while to recognize where we were.
Ridding the sand wore me  out. Trent had to help me up the lip on the hill climb.

About a mile from the trucks I hit reserve.
I dropped my bike in the slow sand washes 2-3 times loosing some gas.