Little Rock City and Winter Camp ride

FINALLY!  Summer is on the way.  With the sun in my face I took on the collection of IAMC Challenge 2010 sites 12 and 15.  On the way I decided to revisit the Centennial Marsh located south of Fairfield, Idaho, it's one of my favorite spring photo opportunities.  The marsh is easy to get to, just turn south of US 20 at Hill City and follow the signs.  As you wind your way through the marsh lands, take it slow and enjoy the blooming camas and exotic bird life.  If you follow the signs correctly you will wind up on a 2 track that takes you to the heart of the marsh and there you will see the center of the camas prairie marsh.  Not many folks even know something like this exists.

Soldier Mountain makes a perfect snow covered backdrop for the lush camas.

  I then zig-zagged across the prairie following the farm roads (only got lost once) and turned south on the Bennett Hills road past Fir Grove Ranch on a well maintained dirt track.  That track connects to Idaho 46 about 5 miles north of the Little City of Rocks turn off.  The GS made it to the parking area -no sweat.  Okay for big bikes when dry but I could see it might be dicey if muddy.  What a great place!  I did a short exploration but with Winter Camp looming I didn't linger.  I may go back for more photos, maybe when the light is low for more textures.  This is a panorama I blacksmithed together out of 8 shots.  I don't need no fancy apps!

The "hoodoo" formations act on your imagination.

After "collecting" site 12 I travelled on Idaho 46 through Gooding and on to Wendell where I stopped for fill-up and a regrettable Maverick ham sandwich.   I then travelled west toward Hagerman where I crossed the Snake River and caught the Saylor Creek Road turn off.  I got lost right away.  The roads were mostly sign-less and the GPS named the roads differently than they were marked on the Benchmark maps.  The Saylor Creek Area is a vast high desert plain with grass and sagebrush covered low hills.  After many intersection stops for reconoitering I figured out I was on the road to Clover  Crossing so I had to go backtrack north to the Winter Camp turn off.  I was aprehesive about the descent into the canyon there but it wound up being pretty easy, even for the big bike. 

This big ol' Chevy truck was awsome!  Give me some fresh gas and a 6V battery and she'd purr like a kitten.  The windshield was still intact too and that in itself is amazing. 

The ride to Bruneau is a hoot... mostly aspahlt and not a straight longer than 100 yards.  The wind blew like a !%&@#*? but only got sprinkles near Mountain Home though Rick had predicted thunder storms for all afternoon.  The GS has a tall profile so an occasional tilt of 10+ degress was necessarey to keep 'er on the tar.  Anyway, I had to stop in Mtn. Home for a little lay-down in the park ...after all I am a really old guy, and then on to home, Boise.  Eight hours saddle time and over 350 miles for 2 sites ... this is going to be a long memorable summer!

This did NOT suck!