Small Trip to the Big Horns

[Bogus Jim]

Since riding the Southern Loop of Wyoming a couple years ago, I've wanted to explore a few more of the trails in the Big Horns. I headed out there last weekend and had a fun ride, although the trip was a little shorter than I'd planned, due to bike issues.

The trip began Saturday morning, with a trail all us locals have probably ridden 30 times, Victoria Lake Road. It's only 10 or so miles outside of Rapid City, so it's a quick way to get off the pavement.




After Victoria Lake, I headed past Rochford and then up through the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon trail exits near Beulah, which is a little out of the way for the route I wanted to take, so about half way through the Canyon, I found this ATV trail that headed towards Sundance. A lot of these are dead ends but I got lucky and this one went all the way through.




After grabbing lunch in Sundance, I rode through the Black Hills of Wyoming. Here's a view looking back at the South Dakota Black Hills, taken near Warren Peak.




Blacktail Creek Road is nice road from the Wyoming Black Hills over to Hulett. The road runs through this valley for several miles. Judging by the amount of hay that was cut, this area has had plenty of rain this summer.




I wanted to find a route that was mostly gravel from Rapid City to the Big Horns, so after leaving Hulett I road a series of roads near the Montana border: Government Canyon, Little Missouri, Riesland, Trail Creek, and Olmstead Road. As the kids nowadays would say, "OMG!" There is NOTHING out here! Without question the most boring stretch I have ever ridden. Seriously, I think you could take your pickup out here, put a brick on the accelerator, and it would run out of gas before it hit anything.




The route actually crossed over into Montana for just a few miles. I spotted this butte and thought I had found the 8th Wonder of the World, after the mind-numbing boredom I'd just ridden through.




Here's a closer view of the 8th Wonder of the World. I don't know the name of the butte, but it's about 3 miles south of Moorhead, MT.




After reaching the Powder River, I headed south on some roads towards Buffalo. The scenery along the Powder River was much better and I could actually recommend this route if it wasn't in the middle of nowhere.

Here's the sleepy little town of Arvada, Wyoming, with the Powder River in the foreground. I couldn't find any gas, but they did have beer. I guess they have their priorities right?



It's embarrassing to admit, but I actually got lost in this town. There are no signs on the roads out of town. First I ended up on Wild Horse Road. After a couple miles, I realized I needed to head the other way, towards Crazy Woman Creek. Wild Horse, Crazy Woman, sounds like a frustrated rancher was head of the road naming committee. After riding through a couple back yards, I found the right road out of town. About 5:45pm, I finally spotted the peaks of the Big Horns on the horizon and about 45 minutes later, I was eating Thai food in a restaurant in Buffalo. No Mountain House food tonight.

Sunday morning was very overcast, but at least it wasn't raining in the Southern Big Horns. I headed south of Buffalo towards Crazy Woman Canyon Road. Here's the road headed into the canyon, just visible in the left of the photo.




The Canyon was pretty cool, especially the first couple miles, where it is quite narrow. There's a sign near the entrance warning of a narrow, steep road. It is definitely narrow in places but it never got very steep or rough. I think you could ride a Goldwing through it.




After the Canyon, I spent the whole morning riding some forest roads and ATV trails. There are a few wide open trails like this one, that are fun to ride at a faster pace.




Here's the view from the top of Hunter Mesa, about 10 miles west of Buffalo. Some of the trails in this area are popular with horseback riders and I tried to avoid those. Horses and bikes just don't mix very well.




A little further south, there's an old fire lookout on the top of Sheep Mountain, 9610 ft. above sea level. Sheep Mountain is not the highest peak in the Big Horns, not even close, but it might be one of the highest that you can legally ride to.




One more view from Sheep Mountain. There was a sign on the fire lookout that I didn't understand, something about a proposed fee of $50 per night. Maybe they allow camping in the tower.




I had planned to stay out a couple more days and ride some of the trails in the northern Big Horns, but Sunday afternoon my bike started acting up a bit. The ignition would cut out, but if you cycled the key off and back on it would start right up again and run fine for another hour or two. Rather than risk getting stranded in some remote area, I headed back home, and took roads a little closer to civilization. I made it back without incident Monday morning.

I still haven't found what I would call an interesting gravel/dirt route from the Black Hills to the Big Horns... if you have one, let me know.

[Lonesome Dave]

Nice report Jim.

A little further south, there's an old fire lookout on the top of Sheep Mountain, 9610 ft. above sea level. Sheep Mountain is not the highest peak in the Big Horns, not even close, but it might be one of the highest that you can legally ride to.

I still haven't found what I would call an interesting gravel/dirt route from the Black Hills to the Big Horns... if you have one, let me know.

On the northern half of the Big Horns, near Burgess Junction (straight up out of Dayton) I've been over 10k on trails.  In fact the Tdub was having some issues running right.  I think we were camped at around 8700 feet.

When Elisa and I came back from Yellowstone earlier this summer, we rode asphalt from Moorcroft, Wy to Osage and eventually gravel from Osage until we hooked up with Hwy 85 near Four Corners, WY.  It was beautiful back in there.  I wanted to take Mallow Camp, Beaver Creek, and Deerfield Road back into RC, but that was met with a resounding "NO."  I still might have that track.

[Bogus Jim]

we rode asphalt from Moorcroft, Wy to Osage and eventually gravel from Osage until we hooked up with Hwy 85 near Four Corners, WY. 

There's gravel from Moorcroft to Black Hills, the issue is west of Sundance / Moorcroft to Big Horns. Private land pretty much forces you onto pavement. One thing is sure, I won't be riding along Montana border again, I'd rather slab it.

[greatbuffalo]

the butte, the 8th wonder of the world is Black eagle Butte. Kind of a neat area but as you said, there's a long ride before you get there. As for sheep Mountain, yes there is a $50 overnight fee for the lookout. I stayed there on the dime of some other kind folks when I headed West after my first spring rally in 2012. I did a an Archeo survey in the Northern Hills in Wy before making my way West into the Big Horns and then on to Billings.

My route took me from Hulette to New Haven to Rocky point and a very similar route to your's from there west. I did not go into MT though. I stayed down in the area East Of Bitter Creek. There are some very cool roads/trails  in that area but quite confusing. There is a trail that runs North From Fence Creek Rd that goes almost straight to Black eagle Butte. There was a very sketchy area were the trail ran out and had to pick it up again. Very difficult as I was riding my Tiger. The whole time thinking, I better not crash out here like I did a few weeks earlier before the Spring Rally that year. I was very thankful to wind my way up to Sayle Road and got myself out before I ran out of fuel. I actually had plenty but you know that feeling you get when you can't seem to find your way out of an area. Finally made it to 212 some how. It was a pretty cool area and would have been better if I had someone else with me. I know that feeling that you get whan things start going wrong and you have no desire to find out what a Hugh Glass type of adventure would be like.

thanks for the report. Brought back a few memories.

[Bogus Jim]

The stretch from the Montana border down to Buffalo, along the Powder river, was pretty nice, I'd ride that again. If you follow that north, it comes out on 212 at Broadus. But on the part from Little Missouri over to Powder River, there's very little to see except sagebrush. Maybe I'll try south of the Interstate next time.

I know what you mean about running out of fuel. I carry the Benchmark atlas for Wy, I find it much more useful and accurate than the gps, but it's possible to ride 15 miles on a trail that you think is open, then run into a locked gate. You can burn up a lot of gas that way.

[Fletch]

looks like a good time!!

[Dr Psyko]

I was just out to Yellowstone for the family vacation, and took hwy 14 through Wy. Beautiful country, but it would have been more fun on bikes, then in the RV. Thanks for the pictures. Love the gravel road through the canyon!

[grubbie]

I just spent two days in the Big Horns, a lot of great scenery, very few challenging trails. Amost everything up there is big bike friendly, very big bike. I could have rode the Hardley through most of it.  BJ is right on the ride to get to the big horns, not much to see. The ride from Gillette to Buffalo is downright depressing. But, if you can get to the town of Bighorn without falling asleep, don't miss Redgrade road, lots of great scenery and hidden trails.
As far as Moorcroft to Sundance, go Moorcroft/Pine Haven/ Old Sundance Hiway/Inyan Kara/Douglas road/ Coal Creek road/ Back onto Old Sundance road. Much quicker than the Montana route, and just a few miles of two lane slab. I can actually avoid pavement altogether from where I live in Rozet, but it invloves crossing private property and private roads owned by my family. Nice pics, Jim!!

[Bogus Jim]

Thanks Rob, I will try that route next time. I thought it might be interesting to ride along the Little Missouri river, that's why I went so far north, but it wasn't interesting, in fact the river was completely dry.