Eastern Oregon – Day 4-7; Gravel Grind. Deschutes Recreation Area to Mitchell

Day: 4 – Oregon Outback Overexertion
June 1, 2023

Distance: 62 miles (199 total)
Deschutes Recreation Area to Shaniko

The Deschutes River State Recreation Area primitive sites are basically around the perimeter of a big field, with an open meadow area in the middle. We awoke to that field full of baby geese. It was adorable. There were also those awkward teenage geese as well. Andrew called me the goose whisperer when I boldly walked through them to get to the bathrooms on the other side. I did get hissed and honked at but for the most part they parted ways to let me through.

We left camp around 8:30am, not a bad start time, but a little later than we probably should have. We knew we had a big day ahead of us. Today we turned south along the Oregon Outback gravel trail, but what made it extra hard was the climbing. It is generally advised to do this Oregon trail from south to north for a reason.

After looking at the elevation profile we knew the first 15 or so miles would be the steepest, then it would gradually mellow out to a more shallow climb. It was a happy surprise to realize that the first 8 or 9 miles were actually paved. We were expecting it to be gravel as soon as we turned south so it was nice to climb some of the hardest bits of hill on pavement.

We were excited when the pavement ended and switched to gravel. It truly felt like an adventure. Rolling past wheat fields, mountains poking out in the distance, and not a car in sight. It truly was a surreal experience.

The hills were no joke though, especially with the gravel we had to push our bikes up some of the steeper hills, but we always kept moving forward. Usually Andrew a little more farther forward than me though.

We took a long break at the semi top of a rather hard climb and our first tourer of the day rolled by (he was going the smarter downhill way). After stopping to make sure we were okay he continued on his happy downhill ride.

Honestly our morning vibes were super confident. We were feeling great. Sure we were going like 4mph, but it was the steepest part of the day. We have all the time in the world. We even found an excellent shade spot by someone’s driveway to break for lunch. We whipped out our chairs for the first time and actually got a little cold sitting in the shade.

At some point we had the option where we could bail and detour over to the town of Grass Valley for a motel. But we had just gotten about half way through our water which is plenty and it was only 2pm, and that’s too early to bail. If you can’t tell, we were still over confident in our capacity for the day and opted to continue on without a detour. Future note to self, 2 pm is NOT too early to bail when you still have 30+miles to the next town with nowhere to stop for water in between.

But we continued on in good spirits. We even saw a couple deer, one of which tried to hit Andrew. Luckily the deer failed in its mission and ran away in shame at its failure.

We also saw three more tourers riding along as we continued on. Again all of them going the smart downhill direction.

As the day wore on the sun got hotter, our water bottles got emptier, and we got more tired. Consequentially we stopped taking as many photos and just pedaled through in relative silence wondering why we decided to do this to ourselves.

Eventually, we decided we couldn’t handle the slow pace of the gravel, opting instead to switch to the highway and have our last 20 miles (and 1000ft of elevation gain) be at least on smooth pavement. As we made our way towards the place where our trail was the closest to the highway we bursted between positive “I can do this” moments of pushing harder and riding fast to “what have we done” and “whose idea was this” barely moving moments.

Just before we reached the highway I actually saw a coyote run by, probably thought we were easy targets it could come back for later. Apparently Andrew was too distracted by our coming choice to see it though. The choice on our minds: go 8 miles back north to a motel in Grass Valley but on the highway, or continue 20 miles south with 1000 more feet of climb to our intended campground in Shaniko. Both of us were down to a little less than a water bottle’s worth of water.

Directly at our juncture there was a huge hill back north to Grass Valley and a relative flat stretch carrying on southward which looked way more appealing in the moment. We also saw the town of Kent on the map 3 miles south of us, but they only had a post office and a Baptist church. So no guaranteed water. I chose to put a lot of faith in Kent thinking surely we’ll be able to get water there! And we opted to push through, continuing south.

On our way to Kent Andrew noticed his front tire had a slow leak. Luckily it was a slow leak so he could at least pump it up and get us to Kent without actually changing or patching it. Spirits were not high.

In the end Kent, OR paid off for us, as we turned into town I saw someone doing yard work and shouted at them asking if we could have some water. How could they say no to a couple of crispy bedraggled tourers? She then even proceeded to tell us where we could find bathrooms by the church. The day had been saved! Huzzah! She did warn us to watch out for crazies though – I’m not sure I want to find out what she meant by that.

Being almost 6pm we decided to cook our dinner at the church in Kent, resting and fueling a bit before the last 16 miles to Shaniko. Andrew was also able to patch his tire in shade and away from the highway. For dinner we tried a new camp recipe, couscous with sundried tomatoes and pine nuts, and Andrew added in some dehydrated veggie mix we carry with us. It was a huge success. We will be making it again (assuming we can find the ingredients).

The last 16 miles to Shaniko were a slog, but we persevered. The pavement was smooth and allowed us to get our speed back up over 10mph so that was nice. Traffic was a little rough, but nothing too crazy.

But in the end we did make it to Shaniko, former wool capital of the world!

We’re staying at the Firehouse RV Park in Shaniko, which apparently just re-opened last year after a several years hiatus. It’s not much, but it does have (pay) hot showers and (also pay) laundry as well as some amazing sunset views. Dave, the camp host and local volunteer firefighter, was super friendly and has some cool aspirations for the campground, granted mostly RV focused but still great for any future bike tourers. I hope he achieves his goals.

What We Ate

Breakfast: oatmeal and instant coava coffee and protein bar
2nd Breakfast: trail mix and dried mangos
Lunch: bean burritos
Dinner: sun-dried tomato couscous
Snacks: bars-so many bars, trail mix, dried mangos, 2 fruit snacks, spoonful of almond butter, hop flavored gu (surprisingly not bad), gu stroopwaffle

Day: 5 – Much Needed Rest Day
June 2, 2023

Distance: 0 miles (199 total)
Shaniko

After over exerting ourselves on day 4 we badly needed a rest day. What cooler place to spend it than in a ghost town?! No ghost sightings for us though.

Since it was a rest day we took our sweet time getting up, and yet that was still slightly too early for the local cafe, Seven Directions, to open (they open at 10). The general store however (which normally doesn’t open until 11) was conveniently open. So we had a breakfast of champions with all sorts of junk foods, and a banana each.

We came back to camp made some coffee and did laundry until it was late enough for the cafe to be open. Unfortunately the cafe’s permanent location had been hit by a semi truck (it’s right off the highway) and the truck was 1 ft shy of going through the entire building! While waiting to figure out if the building can be repaired they have had to relocate to a smaller space in the meantime next to the soon to be open Shaniko Hotel. But the cafe/ice cream parlor seemed to be doing well despite the hardship. The biscuits at Seven Directions were really good, and of course we couldn’t pass up an ice cream opportunity!

Ice cream in hand, Dave our camp host/volunteer firefighter/hotel renovation manager, saw us walking back to camp and asked if we wanted a tour of the Shaniko Hotel they’re renovating. Uh Duh!

It was one of the original hotels in the early 1900s when this was a booming town. (The “Marriott” of the town if you will). It was notably the first hotel in central eastern Oregon to have indoor plumbing with bathrooms inside! He showed us the lobby area, the once bank- soon to be saloon , and the rooms. Several of which have resident ghosts with their own backstory of how they died in the hotel. They even have a mockup bathroom with an original toilet and bathtub. (The one washroom that the whole 40 room hotel shared, but at least you could sign up to take a hot bath!) Don’t worry each room has its own bathroom now. Most of the renovations have been getting the building up to fire code. They’ve also added a single ADA room as well (since all the rooms were on the second floor). Overall a super cool place we’ll probably come back to spend a night once they get it open.

After our hotel adventure we sat around for a while, did some stretching, bike maintenance and general ghost town exploration. One of the guys even came by with a picnic table in a bulldozer for us since they hadn’t yet gotten them set up. What service!

We ate an early dinner at the cafe since they close at 5, immediately followed by a supplemental dinner from the general store that closes at 6.

This lively little ghost town may turn into a zombie town after hearing about all the cool things they’ve got planned!

What We Ate

Breakfast: Pringles, banana, coffee, dates, cranberry juice (general store finds)
Brunch: biscuits and gravy for me biscuits and eggs for Andrew,cold brew and ice cream
Dinner: grilled cheese with root beer and a side pickle from the cafe, followed by half a microwave bean/cheese burrito each from the general store, and a cookie for dessert
Snacks: dates, pickle, dried mangos

Day: 6 – Gravel with a touch of wow
June 3, 2023

Distance: 46 miles (245 total)
Shaniko to Burnt Ranch Campground

Shortly after Shaniko we had two options to get to Mitchell, OR. We could either continue on the gravel route and go past the painted hills, or we could get on the highways and take the scenic bikeway route through Fossil. After thinking it through on our rest day we decided to continue on the gravel route.

Before reaching gravel though we did have a stunning downhill into Antelope, OR (location of Rajneeshpuram). We also saw several animals, mostly deer, or were they antelope!? And some what Andrew thinks were coyotes but I’m pretty sure they were jackalope- coyotes don’t prance like that. You weren’t there you can’t prove me wrong!

When we hit the gravel we stopped for second breakfast in the shade. We expected it to be just as solitary as our day 4 gravel riding, but 3 cars drove by kicking up dust as we tried to enjoy our food.

The morning gravel was fabulous. Junipers were starting to pop up more frequently as we got nearer to the Ochoco Forest which were great for providing more shade spots and they also smell delicious. Andrew had read a thing a while back about adding juniper berries to your water, so he decided to give it a try but he didn’t notice a difference -they probably weren’t ripe enough.

At one point while Andrew was way ahead of me up a hill a truck driver passing by saw me stopped in the shade and offered me a water. What a blessing! Extra water that I didn’t have to carry? And it was gloriously cold too. (I did share some with Andrew when I caught up to him).

We carried on in relatively confident spirits. Our goal had been to reach the campground we’re staying at, but our morning confidence had fluttered the idea of continuing on all the way to Mitchell, a further 20 miles.

We stopped for lunch in a particularly nice patch of shade, and had our 5th can of beans for a classic bean burrito lunch. Andrew was struggling to finish his food, probably because of the heat (and Rosarita, the beans we had, is nowhere near as good as Amy’s refried beans). We took our time at lunch and when we finally got up to leave Angela saw that her rear wheel was flat. Wah Wah. Flat number 4 if you’re counting. There had been a small piece of glass causing a small leak.

We eventually hit the road again, leaving the Oregon Outback and switching to the Central Oregon Backcountry Explorer Route. We started off with a lovely gravel downhill followed by a not so lovely uphill. Optimism started to diminish about reaching Mitchell.

As we were riding along another truck stopped as they passed by, this time offering both Andrew and me two frozen water bottles each! We were so spoiled today. Those frozen waters were so refreshing, and the ice lasted all the way to camp giving us refreshing cold water.

We had two creek crossings after that. The first was pretty minor, more of a trickle, but the second was deep enough to cover our knees! We opted to use that spot to filter and fill up some of our larger water bottles since it was easy access and we would need some for camp tonight anyways.

About 10 seconds after we got rolling after the creek crossing, Angela had another flat- flat number 5. This time it was a front flat, thanks to some thorns. Yes we have had the same number of flats as days riding. Aye aye aye.

By this point we were ready to be at the campground, all thoughts of Mitchell for tonight out the door. We were crashing from the sun. And what we thought would be a constant downhill into camp turned out to involve some probably not that bad to someone not tired, but to us super obnoxious hills.

While today’s ride was easier than day 4, because of our access to water throughout the day and you know it was 20 miles shorter and 2000ft less of climbing, it was still a hard day for us. The sun can really zap you, and the gravel seems to take a toll on us. Even some of the downhills took a lot of effort because they were steep knuckles on the brakes type decents. My tail light screw even wiggled its way loose on one of the bumpier decents, so now its held on with tape -we’ll deal with it once we reach Mitchell tomorrow.

But despite the difficulties today’s ride was full of wow moments. At the top of every hill, the edge of every turn, was just some new land or rock feature that truly made you go “wow”. We even got a sneak peak of some “painted hills” features, although we’ll see the main ones tomorrow.

We eventually spotted the John Day River and knew we were close to the campsite. After a few more hills we finally rolled into Burnt Ranch Campground. This is a primitive campground with no facilities. Pack out everything -yeah everything. But it’s just off the river, so we were able to cool ourselves off by jumping in the John Day River as soon as we arrived. The cold water felt amazing on our cooked bodies.

Being a Saturday there was actually a decent number of people here. Including a couple other new bike tourers. They did a shakedown ride from Mitchell, maybe we’ll end up riding some with them tomorrow as they make their way back.

Tomorrow will be a short day into Mitchell where we’ll be staying in the bike hostel, Spok’n Hostel. While the gravel has been a lot of fun, we are eager to do some paved road riding where the distances make sense to us again and we hopefully won’t roll into camp so exhausted.

What We Ate

Breakfast: oatmeal, coffee and a fig bar
2nd Breakfast: almond butter burrito with banana chips and dates
Lunch: bean burrito
Dinner: instant mashed potatoes with cheese and vegan jerky plus the rest of our sun dried tomatoes and chives.
Snacks: bars, fruit snacks, body armor drink

Day: 7 – Paved and Painted Hills
June 4, 2023

Distance: 20 miles (265 total)
Burnt Ranch Campground to Spoke’n Hostel, Mitchell

Last night stayed surprisingly warm. All our other nights thus far have been fairly cold. Like sleep in lots of layers, use our bags and liners and hats kinda cold. Last night we slept without a lot of those. Don’t get me wrong, not being cold plus my tired body slept great! It just took me by surprise since all the other nights had been so cold.

Once awake we had a few bad omens. First I hear an “oh no” from Andrew outside the tent. Flat number 6 on my rear tire.

Then my nose started bleeding. Probably from the dryness, but not exactly pleasant to deal with at a pack out all your trash site.

As we were eating breakfast, we looked over and guess what? Another flat. But wait there’s more! The camp site was down at the river. It was a very steep 1/4 mile climb to get back to the road. Just as we finished pushing our bikes and were about to roll out, we did our customary ” no flatties, no whammies, no crashes” mantra (copied from Ryan Van Duzer) adding in a “no thorns” then looked down and flat number 8. While putting the tire back on the bike, flat number 9. Maybe we mis-diagnosed flat 8, but this is ridiculous! 4 flats before we even left camp. Are we having fun yet? It’s hard to stay positive when we can’t even get going.

I can’t say a whole lot for the ride. Yes it was still stunningly gorgeous, but I think we were both just stoked to get to Mitchell. Our mantra for the morning was beer, burgers, and beds.

We pulled into the Painted Hills overlook, one of Oregon’s 7 Wonders, for a nice shade break and real bathrooms (by which I mean pit toilets, a real upgrade!). We took some pictures and the continued east on glorious pavement. Pavement is so much faster than gravel.

We basically ground out the last 10 miles into town and headed straight for Tiger Town where we enjoyed much deserved veggie burgers, fries, and beers, topped off with ice cream sundaes.

At the restaurant we ran into Pat, one of the bike hostel owners. Spoke’n Hostel is the coolest bike hostel ever. Mitchell, OR is along the main Transamerica bike route so they do see their fair share of bike riders, and they sure know how to treat them! We were able to have a very pleasant afternoon complete with much needed naps and various errands.

Apparently the Transamerica bike race started today. And the leaders are expecting to pass through Mitchell by 10am tomorrow. Pat and Jalet as well as some other helpers have been preparing a big feast for the racers. Apparently they do it every year and have become known enough that now the racers expect it. They have the leader board pulled up in the common area. I’m amazed that these bikers started in Astoria today and are going to pass us tomorrow!

We’ll be heading east on the Transamerica route tomorrow, so it’ll be a lot of fun to have all the racers pass us. Andrew’s been keeping track of how many tourers we’ve seen (currently at 31) so it’s going to be really hard to keep track tomorrow when the racers start passing us.

What We Ate

Breakfast: Oatmeal and coffee
2nd Breakfast: Trail mix, dried mangos
Lunch: Veggie burgers, fries, beer, and ice cream sundaes
Dinner: Huevos rancheros- 2 eggs, can of black beans, green Chiles, tortillas (cooked in hostel kitchen)
Snacks: Bars, fruit snacks, cherries, bonus ice cream

Can O’ Beans: 6

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