Distance: 29-mile lollipop
Elevation gain: 3160 ft

This ride comes from Oregonian FOB (Friend of Bestrides) Don.

This route has a specific sort of appeal.  It’s as isolated a ride as you can find on a road bike.   You’ll ride for 20 miles without seeing any sign of human presence—no houses, no fences, no “No Trespassing” signs, no directional signs, no street signs, no cars, no people, no nothing.  That 20 miles is through some of the most pristine, virginal forest I’ve ever seen.  Even though the route is dead simple (you literally need to negotiate one intersection), I’ve never felt so lost.

To add to the sense of isolation, both my GPS trackers (on my iPhone and my Garmin) had no idea where I was.  And when you’re in the comfort of your own home with a strong GPS signal, neither Googlemaps nor RidewithGPS will show you the route, because neither acknowledges there’s a paved road there.  And, if you can find the road, no source will tell you what it’s called.  I’m about 70% sure my RWGPS map has the route right, but don’t hold me to it.

So it’s an adventure.  The risk is, in reality, tiny—the route is simple, the road surface is sound—but the sense of risk can be high, and I would in fact take extra water, food, and clothing, because if you run into trouble god knows how long it will be before someone comes along. Since the usual route guides are useless, I’m going to describe the route in excessive detail.

All this may seem off-putting.  Rest assured, it’s a grand and memorable ride—one of my favorite rides in Oregon.  Its only problem is, once you turn onto Eagle’s Rest Rd., the road surface is unpleasant for the next 14 miles—at first coarse chipseal, then worse.  I wouldn’t do the ride without big tires.

Some of the comments below speak of previous storm damage and logging impact on the route.  I last rode it in 8/25 and the conditions were perfect.

(RWGPS erroneously shows a large chunk of the route as unpaved, but it’s all pavement.)

Begin the ride in Dexter, a tiny town notorious for containing the bar where the roadhouse scene in “Animal House” was filmed.  (You can start at the foot of Eagle’s Rest Rd, but you’ll be starting the ride with a leg-killing climb.)  Ride south from Dexter on Lost Creek Rd (passing Lost Valley Rd—lots of getting lost around here) for 3.6 miles, then turn L onto Eagle’s Rest Rd.  Here begins the 20 miles of virgin woods I promised you.

20 miles of this

The afore-mentioned climb begins immediately.  It’s long, uninterrupted, and steep, often 10-12%, and made more difficult by the chipseal surface.  The woods are stunning—don’t let the climbing keep you from appreciating them.

At 8 mi. you hit a false summit.  At 9.6 mi. you hit the real summit.  At this point the hard work of the ride is done.  You roll up and down until mi. 11.7 mi., the one tricky spot in the ride: you reach a fork, and you must go R, though L looks like the primary road (see photo below).   Left fork goes down, right fork goes up—you did it right if you’re climbing (briefly) after the split.  My Garmin marked the new road as “Development Road 512,” but I’ve never seen that name anywhere else.

This is the fork–go right

Once you make that R, you have no more decisions until Mile 23.5, when the road you’re on runs into a much larger, more developed road and you take it to the L.

After the fork and a brief climb, the road drops noticeably, then meanders up and down through less glorious woods (bare conifers, no understory) on a road surface that is often worse than the previous chipseal.  Not awful, but poor.

At mile 17.2, three things happen: 1) you turn north, back towards Dexter; 2) the road surface dramatically improves, to OK; and 3) you start to drop—at first steeply, then more gently, all the way to Mile 23.5.  Some of this descending is spectacular, and much of the foliage is as magnificent as anything I’ve ever seen.   Somewhere along this stretch my Garmin began identifying the road as “Lost Creek Rd.”

At Mile 23.5 you dead-end at the completely unsigned larger, fully-developed (double yellow line) road.  You are in fact at the intersection of Lost Creek Rd. to your L and what Googlemaps labels as “Hartunos Rd.” to the R (not that it does you any good to know this). Go L (actually continuing on Lost Creek Rd.) and continue on Lost Creek Rd. back to your car.  Midway you’ll pass Eagle’s Rest Rd. on your R.

Shortening the ride:  The prettiest foliage is on the leg from the beginning of Eagle’s Rest Rd. to the fork at 11.7 mi. and (riding the route backwards) on the leg from the Lost Creek Rd./Hartunos Rd. fork to the beginning of the serious climb.  Either is a grand out-and-back, the first being a major climb and the second being nearly flat.

Adding Miles:  A few miles down Hwy 58 from Dexter is Oakridge, home of the Aufderheide ride and all the others mentioned in Aufderheide’s Adding Miles section.   If you go northeast from Dexter and cross Dexter Reservoir, all the roads around Fall Creek Reservoir are gorgeous and mellow, especially Big Fall Creek Rd and Ruben Leigh Rd—perfect for a recovery day or social ride.

Distance: 41-mile lollipop
Elevation gain: 3820 ft

This ride is expertly covered in Jim Moore’s 75 Classic Rides Oregon (see the “Oregon” section in Rides by Region).

This is a varied, largely open ride with grand vistas of the Columbia River Gorge, a sweet stretch of old highway closed to cars, a jaw-dropping descent through a comically extreme set of switch-backs, and one strong dose of good old back-country climbing.    It’s about the landscape—I don’t find the road contour or the two communities you pass through (Mosier and the Dalles) terribly compelling.  The route is easier to follow than it sounds—as they say in “Willow,” “Ignore the bird, follow the river!”—unless you miss the turn onto Chenowith Loop W., you really can’t get lost.

The infamous winds of Hood River can be a monkey wrench on this ride  The prevailing direction is out of the west, so check the weather report and expect a headwind on the return ride, especially from the Dalles to Mosier.

The Mosier-to-Dalles loop can be ridden counterclockwise, the only drawback being that it transforms the Rowena Loops from a thrilling steep descent into a steep ascent.

Old Columbia River Drive isn’t open to cars, so some maps and mapping sites don’t acknowledge its existence.  Trust me, it’s there, and you won’t be alone.

Continue reading →

Distance: 80 miles one way
Elevation gain: 7122 ft

This is one of the Oregon rides that is expertly covered in Jim Moore’s 75 Classic Rides Oregon (see the “Oregon” section in Rides by Region).

A Best of the Best ride

The corner of Oregon that’s a loose rectangle with Grants Pass, Brookings, Florence, and Eugene at the corners is a magical place.  The woods are lush, dense, and virginal, like something out of Green Mansions, the roads are narrow and deserted, and you can ride for miles without seeing a human, a house, a fence, or a road sign. There’s endless great riding to be done here.

A great route through the heart of it is the ride from Glendale to Powers. It’s logistically daunting, because it starts in a very small town and ends in a smaller one in the precise middle of nowhere—later I’ll discuss ways of avoiding the problem.  It used to be run as an organized ride called the Tour de Fronds (one of the great century names—say it out loud), but the Tour route has changed (see details in Adding Miles).

I don’t think I’ve ever been so isolated on a road bike as on this ride.  The first time I rode it, in the first 50 miles I saw two vehicles, three humans, and one (unhelpful) road sign.  It’s less deserted and less unmarked now, but still, bring a good map and a compass, and bring everything you might need, because it might be hours before a car comes by.  There’s a Forest Service ranger station in Powers that will sell you an excellent map of the area for $10, if you’re riding from that end.

Even with the relative lack of signage along the route, it’s hard to get lost because there are so few roads out there.  In fact, in these 75 miles you have to negotiate exactly four turns (or an amazing one single turn if you take my alternate route).  My route instructions refer to road numbers from the Benchmark road atlas of Oregon, and I encourage you to get it or some map source of equivalent detail (don’t use mapmyride or RidewithGPS—they overwhelm with needless detail).  Despite all this the road surface is good, and perhaps because of all this the ride is one of my fondest cycling memories.

Despite its length and its wildness, this isn’t a hard ride, except for one killer hill. I can’t explain the RWGPS elevation total.

Head west out of Glendale, a jumble of enormous lumber mills with a small town attached, on Reuben Rd.  If you drive into downtown Glendale, you missed it.  Reuben becomes Cow Creek Rd. once it leaves town.  The riding is good as soon as you clear the last mill.  The landscape on this side of Arrastra Saddle, your mid-ride summit (and a name I can find only on the Tour de Fronds website—not on any map), isn’t lush.  Rainfall is scarcer here, so you won’t see any fronds, and sometimes it borders on stark, but it’s always rewarding.  In a few miles the road turns absurdly and delightfully twisty (you pass a sign that reads “sharp curves next 29 miles”) and the landscape turns at times to clear-cut and at times to forest fire residue.  I find it eerily moving.  Soon you return to riparian woods as you ride along Cow Creek.

The fork: Dutch Henry to the L, our route to the R

Now your first navigational challenge looms.  At 12 miles Cow Creek Rd. makes a wide turn to the R and a very small road goes straight.  This second road could easily be mistaken for a dirt road or a driveway (see photo).  Some sources call it Dutch Henry Road and Benchmark labels it 32-7-19.3—I’m not making this up—but it’s unsigned at the junction.  The only way you know you’re in the right place is a) there are no other roads forking off Cow Creek Rd. to the L, and b) between the two tines of the fork there’s a sign pointing down the main road and reading “Riddle 26 mi, I-5 29 mi, Roseburg 49 mi” (the unhelpful sign I mentioned above), so at least you know which branch is the main road.   You can go either way.  My route stays on Cow Creek Rd. (to the R).  If you take the L fork, you’ll run back into my route at the Arrastra Saddle summit, and you’ll avoid some of the climbing.  I’ve never been that way, but the old Tour de Fronds alternative route used it, so it’s rideable.

Assuming you continue on Cow Creek Rd., at 15 miles you come to a RR crossing, a prominent steel bridge across Cow Creek, and an immediate T.  Incredibly, there is no road sign (there is a sign for people coming from the other direction, which only tells you where you’ve just come from).  The L turn is actually the continuation of Cow Creek Rd, and you want it.  Go L, and take the almost immediate L across another bridge over the same creek and onto (totally unsigned, of course) W. Fork Cow Creek Road.

Powers South Road

Down W. Fork Cow Creek Road a few miles is a small, unsigned (surprise!), nameless, and uninspiring looking little road, marked 32-9-17 in Benchmark and BLM Rd. 32-9-35 in Mapmyride, that goes off to the L at a sharp angle (about 8 o’clock) and drops substantially.  Take it.  At this intersection I stopped one of the two vehicles I met on this road and asked, “Can you get to Powers on this road?”  The driver looked at me like I was nuts and said, “Well, I guess you CAN….”  you’ll know you’re on the right road if you drop straight down to a creek, cross it, and climb steeply for 8.5 miles at a consistent 8%—one of the hardest climbs I’ve ever done.  All the hard climbing in the route is right here, in this one hill.

NF 3348

Go R at the intersection (turn #3) when the climbing is over (which is Arrastra Saddle, and is also where Dutch Henry Rd. comes in on our L) and your navigation is complete—just stay on the new road, NF 3348, until you get to Powers.   You’re on the rainy side of the divide now, so the flora is absolute rainforest stunning from here to the end of the ride (fronds at last),  and much of the way you’re following the creeks and rivers so you have the visual pleasures of a charming stream.  As pretty a ride as I’ve ever seen.

The rest of the ride is all flat or downhill save for 1 short climb.  Descent for 4 splendid miles from the summit.  Then comes the last short climb.  Then the road levels out and follows a sleepy, charming stream through alder forest, for several miles.  Then a sweet 3-mile descent takes you to a stop sign, where you go R and follow the road to Powers.  The road surface between the summit and the stop sign has frequent major imperfections, but you’re saved by three things: 1) the imperfections are spaced far apart—perhaps one every 1/4 mile—and the pavement between them is smooth; 2) they’re almost always fore-and-aft cracks where the downhill half of the road has sunk, so you ride along rather than across them; and 3) someone has thoughtfully marked them with white paint so you can see them coming.  Keep scouting ahead and you can pick a line through them easily.

About halfway down the descent, you pass Coquille Falls on your R, marked by a very small dirt turn-out, a Forest Service sign, and a tiny wooden sign with “Coquille Falls” carved in it.  I’m told it’s about 1/2 mile to a spectacular falls, but I haven’t done it yet.

After the stop sign, you’re on Powers South Rd. (NF 33), and the character of the ride changes.  You go from zero traffic to light traffic, the road is wider and straighter (though still delightful), you pass frequent campgrounds along the Coquille River, and the flora is less foresty and more riparian (alders and maples instead of conifers).  It’s gentle rising and falling, mostly falling, all the way to Powers.  About 1/2 mile down NF 33, right after the bridge/sharp turn, there’s a Forest Service kiosk on the R which has a nice map for getting your bearings, and a bathroom.

The eponymous fronds

If you like organized rides or feel uncomfortable riding through relatively deserted back country alone, the new Tour de Fronds runs several routes of various lengths, from short to 117 miles, all beginning and ending in Powers.  Many of the routes are loops, and many of them involve dirt and gravel roads.  The Tour people are wonderful and the small-town hospitality is a delight, so if you like supported rides I encourage you to put this on your to-do list.

Shortening the route/Avoiding the shuttle: There is excellent out-and-back riding at either end of our route.  You can ride Cow Creek Rd. as an out-and-back, discussed below.   Even better, you can ride from Powers as an out-and-back.  The two obvious turn-around points are Eden Valley, 31 miles out, and the Arrastra Saddle summit, 36 miles out.  Riding from Powers gives you all the route’s best scenery and skips (most of) the severe climbing—riding to Eden Valley is about 2800-3500 ft of gain and involves you in one moderate 3-mile climb.

Adding miles: Again, this is one of those areas where you can point the bike in any direction and find great roads.

The Bear Camp ride described in Adding Miles under the Gold Beach Century in our list runs parallel to the Tour de Fronds route a stone’s throw to the south.

At the Glendale end you can continue on Cow Creek Rd. past the West Fork turn-off and ride until the riding gets poor, then turn around.  This is all very good stuff and plenty of it, though often dry and hot—avoid it on hot summer middays.  It follows Cow Creek downstream on the way out, so it’s an almost imperceptible descent, which of course will be a slight climb coming back, and I don’t think there’s a hill in the entire road.  It eventually comes out in Riddle on Hwy 5, but miles before that it changes from a tranquil, lovely, meandering back road into cycling hell—big, busy, straight, commercial—so expect to turn around about mile 34.

The road from Powers north to Hwy 42—the Powers Highway or #542—is surprisingly good, a constantly varied roller coaster through pretty farming country.

NF 33 continues south of where we joined it for many miles past our route’s turn-off.  It’s officially the Rogue-Coquille Scenic Highway, and you can ride it to Agness and all the way to Gold Beach.  The road is lined with campgrounds, which usually means vacation traffic, and it’s popular with motorcycles, but in my experience the road is next to vehicle-free anyway.   The road to Agness involves 11+ miles of gravel and a major climb up to a summit and down the back side—the Tour de Fronds runs a loop route to Agness and back if you want support (thanks to Slim and Sandy of the Tour de Fronds for this info).

Distance: 97-mile figure-eight
Elevation gain: 7330 ft

(A Best of the Best ride)

When was the last time you rode 100 miles and almost every mile was choice?  Here’s your chance.  I learned this route when it was an annual organized century ride.   It’s two loops connected by a stretch of Hwy 101, and it offers a remarkable variety of riding conditions: rollers along one of the most scenic stretches of coastline in the world, two substantial climbs, one wonderful descent, a ride along a ridge with ocean views, mellow riding along the Rogue River, and a charming, easy meander through meadows and forests.  The northern loop is flat and pretty, the southern loop is up-and-down and dramatic.  There’s a fair amount of elevation gain, but in the entire 100 miles there is not one foot that is steep.  The ride starts and ends in Gold Beach, a low-key, relatively untouristy Oregon beach town.

There’s a lot of navigation on this route, so have some means of knowing where you are and where you’re going.  Ride out of Gold Beach south on Hwy 101.  In California the west coast highway  is something to be avoided whenever possible, but Oregon’s Hwy 101 is a mellower, more peaceful thing, and Gold Beach is a long way from anywhere (as you know from trying to get there), so it’s as good as coastal riding gets.  Which means, I still hate it—huge trucks whizzing past you inches from your body, a shoulder that tends to disappear precisely when you need it most, glass and cat tread tracks on the shoulder when there’s a shoulder, and constant big rollers, ruler straight and dead boring.

View from Arch Rock Overview

But the turn-outs, vista points, and beaches are without peer, and they seem to come every 1/4 mile on this leg. I recommend you stop at all of them.  The last 11 miles of this stretch of coast is called the Samuel Boardman Scenic Corridor, and they aren’t kidding when they say “scenic.”  My favorite beach is Meyers Creek Beach (the beach is perfect, and the hike from the road to the beach is about 3 feet), just before the better-known Pistol River Beach, where you can watch surfers and kite-boarders do their thing.  The much-hyped Cape Sebastian is actually just a vista point where the views of the coastline are surprisingly poor (walking down the trail gets you a better view).  Much better views are at Arch Rock further along.

Just south of Gold Beach you do a 2-mile climb, then a 2-mile descent on Hwy 101.  If 2-mile descents on shoulders amid busy traffic aren’t your thing, modify our route by taking Myers Creek Rd. (clearly marked to the L, opposite the Cape Sebastian turn-off) and follow MCR to where it rejoins 101.  It’s the opposite of 101—small, deserted, winding, and with a fairly rough road surface.  MCR is on our return route, so you’ll do it as a climb later.

After 27 miles of 101, turn L onto Carpenterville Rd. and follow it east, then back north, then west until it ends at a stop sign.  You start with a mellow climb away from the West Coast shoreline.  The scenery starts out scruffy but gets prettier and prettier.  After a half hour you hit a false summit, and the rest of the miles to “Carpenterville” (which is absolutely nothing) roll up and down, mostly up, along a ridge spine through very pretty woods with very nice vistas out to the ocean on your left (if the air is clear) and into interior valleys on your right.  Finally you reach the real summit (someone has written “summit” on the roadway to dispel any doubts), whence begins a splendid descent back down to the coast, a long, effortless, glassy-surfaced slalom course you’ll dream about for years.  25-30 mph, and you’ll never touch your brakes.  It’s been recently (as of 9/21) re-chipsealed, lord knows why since the surface was glass, but Oregon chipseal is much less obnoxious than California chipseal so it only drops the descent from spectacular down to excellent.

Traffic from your turn-off onto Carpenterville Rd. all the way back to where Myers Creek Rd. joins Hwy 101 should be next to nothing.  The last time I rode Carpenterville, on a lovely September afternoon, from Pistol River to Carpenterville and back (14 miles) I saw one vehicle.

At the bottom of the Carpenterville descent you hit a stop sign (no signage), where you could go L and rejoin Hwy 101 for the ride back to Gold Beach, but don’t.  Instead, go R (over the bridge) and ride around the tiny hamlet of Pistol River and up and down the hill until you hit a fork.  An unsigned slight L again would take you back to Hwy 101.  Don’t do it.  Go R onto Cape View Rd. (signed).  The “cape” in the road name is Cape Sebastian, which you see clearly far ahead of you and is your destination. This little stretch of road is a treasure.  It’s flat, and it parallels Hwy 101 about 200 ft further up the sidehill, so you are constantly looking down on Hwy 101, with its frantic traffic, and the beaches and sea stacks along the coast.  The perspective and solitude are just marvelous.  Slow way down—it’s all over far too soon.

Cape View ends at a completely unsigned fork.  Once again, the dominant L fork takes you back to Hwy 101, and once again we don’t want it.  Go R onto Meyers Creek Rd.  Here’s why: you need to get back up to the saddle on Hwy 101 by the Cape Sebastian vista point.  It’s a big climb, and you can do it in two ways: slogging up a dead straight, unvaried 5% shoulder for what feels like an hour on Hwy 101, with traffic flashing past at 65 mph, or riding up the same 5% pitch on Meyers Creek Rd., which is quiet, beautiful, and with a deliciously varied contour.  They both go to the same place.  Easy choice.  Take Meyers Creek.  The imperfect road surface we talked about earlier is not an issue at 7 mph.

When MCR dead-ends at Hwy 101, take 101 back to Gold Beach.  Ride through town and turn R onto Jerry’s Flat Road and head up the south side of the Rogue River.  Note your mileage total, because you’re going to ride 10 miles of pleasant, easy rollers and then turn L on Lobster Creek Road, which is unsigned, and cross the river on Lobster Creek Bridge, which is invisible from JFR.   The turn is completely non-descript, and the only signage you get is a road sign indicating directions to a campground, two trailheads, and a lookout.

If you’re adventurous there are two off-road hikes worth considering in the Lobster Creek Bridge area.  First (the tough one), just before LCR you see a sign for the Frances Shrader Memorial Trail to the R.  Take it and ride 2 very steep mostly-dirt miles to an easy, stunning one-mile walking loop through old-growth Port Orford Cedars and Douglas firs.  Second (and much less daunting), just on the other side of the bridge is the steep 1/4-mile side road (sorta paved) to the Myrtle Tree Trail (well-marked), a walking trail to what used to be the largest Oregon Myrtle tree in the world until it fell down in 2018.  Very pretty.

Back on our route, cross the bridge, take an immediate L at an unsigned fork, and ride back down the other side of the river on the wonderfully named North Fork Rogue River Road (unsigned), which turns out to be a really swell road, constantly up and down and back and forth, twistier and hillier than Jerry’s Flat Rd and with better views of the river.  Turn R on Cedar Valley Drive (erroneously called Squaw Valley Rd. on some maps—it’s the road to Ophir). This is a really pretty if unspectacular meander through meadows, horse farms, and dry forest—totally pleasant, nearly flat, and constantly winding back and forth, just about what you want after riding all those more demanding miles.

Most of Cedar Valley Drive looks exactly like this

Ride to where CVD dead-ends at Ophir Rd., and turn L on Ophir (don’t bother to go R to explore the “town” of Ophir—there’s nothing there). The rest of the route is fairly routine. Ride on Ophir along Hwy 101 until you see an opportunity to cross the highway and ride through Nesika Beach, merge onto 101 when you have to, get off at Old Coast Highway on your R and ride OCH until you’re forced to rejoin 101 to cross the Rogue River into Gold Beach.

Shortening the route: Pick the loop that’s to your taste, easy/pretty (northern) or hard/dramatic (southern). Even easier: ride the Carpenterville Loop.  Easier still: if you aren’t keen on riding the coast (and I’m not), you can do a swell c. 40-miler by riding our route from Carpenterville to Gold Beach backwards: ride from Gold Beach to the Carpenterville summit, then turn around and ride it back to Gold Beach.  Easiest of all: ride Jerry’s Flat Rd. and North Bank Rogue River Road as a loop—22 miles of gentle rollers and good river views.

Adding miles:  From the Lobster Creek Bridge, Jerry’s Flat Road continues for a very pretty and less crowded 18 miles to the little hamlet of Agness.  From Agness, if you’re up for a ride that’s the stuff of legend, you can take tiny, isolated Bear Camp Road for another 50 miles or so on to Galice (thus intersecting the Galice to Golden ride) and keep going until you get to Grant’s Pass 20 miles later, and you’ll have a tale you can tell your grandchildren.

Hunter Creek Road, which you pass just south of Gold Beach, is a sweet 5 miles of pavement before it turns to dirt.

Afterthoughts: a large part of the beauty of this ride is the views you get of the coast and ocean on the southern loop—from Highway 101, from high up on Carpenterville Rd., and from Cape View Rd.   The Oregon coast, like any other stretch of northwestern coastline, is given to fog.   For the full effect, try to ride on a day with clear skies.

Distance: 58 miles one way
Elevation gain: 3730 ft

This is one of the Oregon rides that is expertly covered in Jim Moore’s 75 Classic Rides Oregon (see the “Oregon” section in Rides by Region).

Oakridge is an amazing place to ride.  It’s a sweet, utterly unpretentious little town with cheap and charming motels and nice restaurants that was completely under the radar until people noticed it had world-class mountain biking in every direction (check out the Mountain Bike Oregon weekend if you ride dirt).  Now every mountain biker in America knows about it, but it also has prime paved roads leaving it in all directions, not counting the main highway, which is scenic but large and busy.  The plum is the Aufderheide (pronounced OWF der HIGH dee) Highway, AKA Forest Road 19, heading north.  It’s called a highway, but every time I’ve ridden it I’ve seen about a car a mile.  It’s a straight ascent to a summit and descent down the back side, and it’s equally good in either direction.  I’m starting at the south end, for no particular reason.

The terrible fire of 2022 burned most of the McKenzie River valley between Eugene and Aufderheide badly, so you might worry that the northern end of our ride is ugly, but the burn stopped a few miles short of our route and Aufderheide itself is as far as I know untouched.

The road is a bit straighter and a bit more consistent in pitch than I would wish, but you won’t care because the scenery is as good as anything in our list: perfect Oregon rain forest, than which there is nothing prettier, and by some miracle there is a gorgeous creek running alongside you as you ride on either side of the summit (much more visible on the south side than on the north).   The pitch is shallow (3700 ft of gain in 58 miles), so you won’t do do real work until the mile or so before the summit on either side. Continue reading →

Distance: 33-mile loop
Elevation gain: 3035 ft

This is one of the Oregon rides that is expertly covered in Jim Moore’s 75 Classic Rides Oregon (see the “Oregon” section in Rides by Region).

A Best of the Best ride

Obviously.  It’s a chestnut, and it’s in a National Park, so it’s heavily trafficked, but it’s a bucket-list ride if there ever was one.  It’s only 33 miles, but it’s a workout because it’s all up and down (RWGPS pegs the elevation total at just under 4000 ft)—I’ve never finished it and wished it were longer.  I’m short on photos, but you can google “Crater Lake photos” if you don’t have the iconic image burned into your retina already.  See Afterthoughts for a way to avoid the traffic.

Weather matters on this ride.  The Rim Road is closed by snow in the winter.   West Rim Drive gets plowed in the spring, and the rest of the Rim Road gets plowed later—exactly when depends on the size of the snowpack (West Rim opened very early, in late May, in 2021).  The same logic applies if you’re camping by the lake—in 2021 the main campground opened in mid-June, which was atypically early.

If you hate traffic, “I know a way out of hell,” as Gandhi says.  The National Park Service runs a free program called Ride the Rim, in which they close two-thirds of the loop to cars for two consecutive Saturdays a year—Sept. 10and 17 in 2022.   (They have to keep the West Rim road open for through traffic.)   As I’ve said about similar road closures, I’m not sure I prefer a thousand bikes on the road to a hundred cars.

If you crave standing on the lake shore and touching the water, you have one option: 4.6 miles past North Junction (the meeting of N. Entrance Road and West Rim Drive) there is a prominent trailhead, parking lot, and bathroom marking the beginning of the Cleetwood Trail, the only public trail from the rim road to the water.  It’s only 1.1 miles one way, but it’s very steep and the footing is treacherous.  Check out the National Park website’s description, which is full of dire warnings.

I’m told that cross-country skiing the road in winter is a bucket-list experience as well.

Indoor lodging at Crater Lake means Crater Lake Lodge, which is booked solid up to a year in advance.  There’s very nice camping in the Mazama Village campground.  It’s colder than you think at night, even in the middle of summer (average June low 33 degrees), so dress accordingly.

Continue reading →

Distance: c. 60-mile loop
Elevation gain: c. 2500 ft

A shorter version of this ride is included in Jim Moore’s 75 Classic Rides Oregon: the Best Road Biking Routes from Mountaineers Books.

The Willamette (“wuh LAM ut,” famously mispronounced by President Bartlet in The West Wing) Valley is among the prettiest farming valleys in the USA.   It’s flat, roads go everywhere, and they’re mostly straight and all pretty much the same, so it’s all about rolling along and drinking in the ambiance.  All Oregon ride guides have Willamette Valley rides, and usually they strive to string together as many covered bridges as possible (it’s easy to find routes with 5-6 of them).  Nothing wrong with that.  But I like a little climbing, a little forest, so this ride takes you through the heart of valley, then does a fine climb into the hills on the east side to a pretty falls and and returns via a nice descent.  There’s about 9 miles of climbing, all easy except for 1 mile of 7%, so overall it’s an easy day.

I was introduced to this ride by the weekend version of Cycle Oregon, that massive, wonderful, annual introduction to the glories of Oregon cycling.  Check them out.

Ride from Salem to Silverton (15 miles by highway) via the map’s roads.  Or you can wander, since all roads in the valley are pretty much the same—just stay off the big road, Hwy 213.  From Silverton, ride to Silver Falls State Park via Rd #214, Silver Falls Drive.  This leg begins with an easy (3-5%) 8-mile climb that will get you up out of the valley and into the lush Oregon rain forest (at least it was pouring rain when I was there).  Silver Falls themselves are a very pretty falls you can view from a turn-out if you don’t want to get off your bike.  If you’re not in a hurry, the State Park is a fully developed area with an extensive hiking-trail system—most famously the Trail of Ten Falls—and a four-mile paved bike path, all well worth a lengthy stop if you brought your walking shoes and bike lock.

Continue on and the road (now Silver Falls Highway) brings you back down out of the hills and returns you to the valley.   Work your way back to Salem via our map’s roads.

Shortening the route: Begin in Silverton and ride the Falls loop.

Adding miles: There is no end to the mileage you can rack up exploring the farm roads of the Willamette Valley, but I warn you it’s all more of the same.  Plus covered bridges.

Distance: 35 miles out and back
Elevation gain: 2966 ft

The loop described in “Adding Miles” below is discussed in Jim Moore’s 75 Classic Rides Oregon: the Best Road Biking Routes from Mountaineers Books.

This is a simple, perfect ride.  It’s a 20-mile delicious climb and descent through the usual drop-dead gorgeous Oregon rain forest (forty miles round-trip).   These aren’t the grand, towering redwood forests of our McKenzie Pass or Brice Creek rides—rather, these woods are small, delicate, and aery.  Think sylphs and fairies, not Ents. There’s a fine little waterfall halfway in that serves as a natural break (so take a lock), and a charming country mercantile store at the turn-around point.

This is the sort of riding where you want to pack away your computer, forget about speed or pace or getting a work-out, and just BE in this magical place on your bike.  Stop often to gaze and to listen to the water and the birds and the complete absence of another sound.

I don’t know what’s going on with RidewithGPS, but the elevation profile for this ride is just wrong.  RWGPS says that the 2-mile climb on the ride out has a lot of 12-14% stuff and maxes out at 17%.  This is absurd.  The climb is work, but my legs say it’s never more than 10%.  Similarly, RWGPS says the big climb on the return is 1 mile long and has lots of 12% stuff.  Again, absurd.  The climb is 2 miles long and is easy to moderate—I’d say never more than 7%.  Have no fear.

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Distance: 77 miles one way
Elevation gain: 3590 ft

A modified version of this ride is included in Jim Moore’s 75 Classic Rides Oregon: the Best Road Biking Routes from Mountaineers Books.

This ride is another of those routes leaving the Oregon coast and heading inland along a nearly flat river.  Like all the others, it’s gorgeous, easy (for a while), largely undeveloped, and close to car-free.  In this case, Highway 38 running parallel just to the south siphens off everyone except the few people who live along Smith River Road.  The isolation is in places extreme.  The difference between this ride and the other coastal rides in Bestrides is, this one doesn’t end after a few miles.  If you want to do it all, you’ll want a shuttle.

The first 42 miles are especially beautiful and almost effortless.  The lovely Smith River is smack on your shoulder much of the way, the road is small, and you’re often riding in a canopy with mottled sunshine peaking through the maples.  This stretch of road is that rarity in this list, a flat ride—in the first 20 miles, all upstream, you climb 650 ft, as the river rises a grand total of 30 ft.  But don’t expect it to be “downstream” when you turn around if you’re riding an out and back—it’s just about the same 650 ft.

It’s an easier ride in the other direction, but I’ve mapped it west-to-east because the west end is the unmissable part of the ride and I expect those of you without a shuttle to ride it as an out and back.

(Unless I’ve mis-mapped the route, it’s all paved despite RWGPS)

Between Gardiner and Reedsport, turn off Hwy 101 onto Lower Smith River Road, aka Hwy 48 (signed, but understated), park at any turnout, and start riding.  In the beginning, the river is very wide and the landscape very open, but in a few miles the river narrows and the foliage closes in.  From there until you leave the river, the canopy comes and goes, and the river, when it isn’t right next to you, is often bordered by marsh or meadow.  The view keeps alternating among canopy, meadow, river vista, backlit riverbank maples…you won’t be able to decide which is prettier.

It’s a tranquil ride

When I first rode this route a few years ago, the sense of solitude was intense.  As with all pretty back-country roads in the West, people have realized that living on Smith River Rd. would be pretty cool, and you won’t be alone until well into the ride.  As evidence of this, there is now a large country store and RV park just after North Fork Rd. (which is Hwy 48, surprisingly) takes off to the L, just past 14 miles in.  But we’re talking about the difference between “car-less” and a car every mile.

At first the road surface is pristine.  Around 14 miles in, there’s a sign reading “End County Maintenance” and the surface turns to moderately rough chipseal.  As meager compensation, someone has painted mileage markers on the road beginning there.

About 31 miles in, West Fork Smith River Rd. takes off to the L, and you keep east along the main river.  39 miles in, you leave the river (actually, the river leaves you, bending sharply south at a Y, and taking Smith River Road with it) and continue straight ahead/east.  The road changes its name to South Sister Rd.  (There’s a North Sister Rd. taking off to your L just before the Y, and it goes to the same place, but I think it’s dirt.)  Now everything changes—you start climbing and the land dries out.  If you’re here for the river ambience and the flat, this is the place to turn around.  Frankly, the rest of the ride, while rewarding, can’t match what you’ve just done.

Try to do the ride when there’s some sun

Fifty-seven miles in you reach Alma, which is merely an intersection with Siuslaw (pronounced sigh-OOH-slaw) Rd.  Go R on Siuslaw about a mile and take Wolf Creek Rd on your left.  At the end of Wolf Creek Rd there’s a jog and you continue on Crow Rd into Eugene.

Shortening the route: This ride is easy to cut short because the best miles are the first ones, along the river.  That’s the first 39 miles, and you can turn around any time, but try to make it in at least 17 miles or so.  It’s very easy riding.

Adding miles: The area southwest of Eugene you’ve just ridden through is a network of small, pretty up-and-down roads.  Briggs Hill, McBeth, and Fox Hollow are particularly nice.   See the Adding Miles section of the Siuslaw River Road ride for more info.  If you’re in Eugene with a car, north of town is the classic McKenzie View loop: McKenzie View Drive>Hill>Sunderman>Marcola>Old Mohawk>McKenzie View Drive.

At the turn onto Wolf Creek Road you’re at the turn-around point of our Siuslaw River Road ride.  It takes you to Lorane, whence you can continue east on Cottage Grove-Lorane Rd. to Cottage Grove.  It’s a pleasant little town with a good BBQ joint (Big Stuff).

Riding in this area definitely requires a good map, and there used to be one, the Lane County Bicycle Map, which was an absolute work of art, with designated ride routes, traffic levels, and degree of pitch all marked out for you.  The LCBM covered the entire route of the Gardiner to Eugene ride, even though the first half of the ride is not in Lane County.  It’s no longer in print.  If you can find an old copy, don’t let it go.

On the ocean end, you’re close to a ton of good riding if you can stand some traffic. The ride north on 101 from Gardiner to Florence is supposed to be particularly nice, and in fact all of Oregon 101 is a legendary route for bike touring—less trafficked, more laid-back, and much more dotted with coastal towns and hamlets than California Highway 1.  As I mentioned before, Coos Bay, Reedsport, and Florence all have nice, mellow highways running inland along rivers, but they’re all a tad more trafficked than I like.

Afterthoughts: Water is hard to come by on this route.  Once you pass the store, you may be without a resupply until you beg water from the ranches near Eugene.  There’s nothing at Alma.  Time to break out the camelbak.

There are rudimentary bathrooms at National Forest Service launch ramps along the first 20 miles.