Heading East to Explore the Wild West
About a year after wrapping up our Pacific Coast tour (so last summer) Andrew and I started to get the itch to go on another bike adventure. But since we try to maintain a “normal life” balanced with our life on the road we knew we would have to wait at least a LITTLE while before going on another adventure. Two years off is enough right?
Now to figure out where to go. After dealing with all the road traffic of the Pacific Coast, we decided our next tour would be somewhere a little more remote. We also really like the idea of not needing to sort out start/finish travel logistics, so we wanted our next adventure to start and end at home (Portland, OR). Luckily, Oregon offered us just the place that met all our needs, the Wild West.
Wild Wild West
Once east of the Cascade Mountains, Oregon is a whole different world from the lush green and rainy evergreen forests the Pacific Northwest is famous for. Unlike its western counterpart, Eastern Oregon is a high desert with your occasional pine forest sprinkled in. The area is vast, open, and breathtakingly beautiful. Luckily for us, there’s a whole network of very low traveled logging roads, small towns, and a whole lot of sights to see. I also really like the novelty of needing to head east to see the “American West“. So come June, that’s where we’re going – Eastern Oregon!
For this trip we’re leaving the tandem behind and instead we will be on our individual bikes this time. Salsa Vaya, for me and Velo Orange Polyvalent for Andrew. It’ll be interesting to see how the lengthy multiday rides compare tandem vs regular bike.
The Timeline
We decided we wanted our next ‘big’ bike tour to be about a month long. Hopefully long enough to get in the groove, but short enough to skip the “slump” phase we had on the Coast ride around day 38 – I guess we’ll see. We’re opting for our ride to be in June, 2023. The idea being that we’ll be riding around the desert before it gets too hot (and before any streams dry up). But, also late enough to avoid the bulk of the spring rains and any lingering snow on the mountain passes.
Mileage wise, we are hoping to maintain 50mi/day averages. This should be doable for us, but there are some killer climbs out there and we do like going slow. Unfortunately the extra rainy spring this year has not helped our training much; my rigorous training schedule seems to be more of a decorative wall hanging than an actual regimen! So we’ll see what actually happens mileage wise. Our intention is also to have a rest day every 4thish day. Hot Lakes Hot Springs out of La Grande is definitely on the radar for a much deserved rest day by the time we make it out there (if we make it that far)!
The Route Planning
So we wanted this ride to be a little more free form than last time. We’re hoping to have more flexibility for last minute side quests and detours. So, unlike our Pacific Coast tour, we don’t have a route per se. We won’t be going out there blind though – please, we are too much of planners for that. I decided to compile a bunch of Oregon Scenic Bikeway routes, Bikepacking.com routes, and a couple others that I found in books/on the internet all into one map (see below – I figured some of y’all could make use of this resource for your own trips as well, so I wanted to share it!) I plotted the bike routes I found all out on a google maps so we could easily see what areas would be a little more ‘bike friendly’ or at least ‘bike easier’.
We picked a general route idea based on stringing together routes on the map. We did need to have some basic idea of mileage count and what might be possible for us to do in a month. But rather than stick to our preplanned “route” our intention is to take advice along the way in regards to any detours or attractions, and not to hold ourselves to the original route – so if you have any gems, PLEASE SHARE! (that includes if there are areas we should avoid).
- Purple routes are Oregon Scenic Bikeways (so lots of signage and enroute support)
- Blue Routes are from Bikepacking.com (so more gravel focused)
- Yellow are various other routes I found that looked interesting…. I tried to credit where I found the routes if you click on the trail…. but honestly it was a lot of searching RideWithGPS routes and seeing common routes that I could download. (apologies if I missed any credits where credits are due – just let me know and I’m happy to add it!)
if you click on the image at the left you can also toggle on/off info/attraction points along the route – most were suggested by the route sources, some were added by me
In addition to what is shown, the TransAmerica Route (Section 2) by Adventure Cycling Association also cuts across Oregon from Baker City through Mitchell and Eugene along Hwy 7 & 26 – I just couldn’t find a gpx file to upload to my consolidated map and was too lazy to manually add it in.
Our Route Idea
In general our plan is to get across the Cascade Mountains via the Columbia River Gorge (reverse of our 3 day ride last year). Just east of The Dalles we’ll follow the Oregon Outback gravel trail south and cut over into Mitchell, OR. Once in Mitchell we’ll start heading east again, utilizing the Painted Hills and/or Old West Scenic Bikeways. We’ll continue East toward Baker City. I’m hoping to do the Grand Tour Scenic Bikeway between La Grande and Baker City before making our way back west* back toward Mitchell. From Mitchell we’ll have a couple options based on how we’re feeling and doing on time. But, Currently the plan is to make our way to the McKenzie Pass (elevation 5,325ft) to get back west of the Cascades towards Eugene (hoping to catch that snow free/car free sweet spot on the mountain pass – but we’ll see). Once in Eugene we can take a train home, or ride up the Willamette Valley Scenic Bikeway to get back home depending on how we are doing on energy and time. This estimated route is around 1080 miles.
*I’ve heard the route circling the Wallowas is awesome but it’s an extra 300 miles of distance and 20,000 ft of climbing so I’m guessing we won’t have time to include it in this trip. So for now it’s not part of the plan…. but as mentioned, hoping to go with the flow more on this ride – so we’ll see!
We are thankful to ride in these places and to experience them slowly and consciously from the bike. While our tour will take place in what is today called Oregon, this general route passes through traditional lands of several nations which are now included in the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians, and the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde as well as the Cayuse, Umatilla, and Walla Walla. These nations and people have been stewards of the land since time immemorial and continue to live and thrive in these places. We will strive to be good visitors and guests while traveling and give thanks for the past, present, and future role that these groups have played in caring for these lands.
Additional Gear
Believe it our not, 2 months on tour in 2021 didn’t supply us with enough gear, and since we like to travel, well camp, in relative comfort, we still wanted more gear for this route beyond what we’ve already accumulated:
- Water Filter ($40) – For the Pacific Coast we had brought along iodine tablets with us and never once used them…. for this route we are expecting to see a lot less water fountains so we’ll actually need to collect water from streams. We decided the tablets wouldn’t be enough this time so we bought a filter (but we will still be bringing the tablets for any extra sketchy water sources).
- Some generic paper Oregon Maps as well as ACA TransAmerica Section 2 maps ($22.70). We probably could have skipped buying these, but we like having maps and found the ACA maps to be super helpful/informative on our Pacific Coast Tour – so may as well support them by buying the relevant map.
- A Personal Location Beacon (PLB) ($330!) was next on our list because we’re expecting to be without cell service a lot more and in general a lot more remote than the Pacific Coast ride was. Not to mention that at some point I developed a probably irrational fear of one of us getting bit by a rattlesnake. And you know, better safe than sorry. We opted for the one time purchase PLB instead of a subscription based satellite messenger option. We decided the PLB would be more useful to have in our regular lives since we don’t want to keep paying subscription fees.
- Nicer Camp Pillows. ($40 x 2) I know I know – what a luxury! How well you sleep can exponentially effect your level of fun after all.
- New Sleeping bag liners. ($75 x 2) We expect the overnight temperatures to get a little lower than our sleeping bags are rated for. We opted to buy some 15 degree liners rather than buy all new bags to account for the colder temps.
- Borrowed camp chairs from Andrew’s folks. Less services/campgrounds/parks means less public seating and we don’t want to have to always be sitting on the ground. Hopefully we don’t regret bringing these cause they do add a decent amount of bulk.
- An extra External Battery – since we’ll be on our own bikes instead of the tandem our chances of separating are much higher (i.e. no longer zero) so we wanted to make sure we both had access to an external battery should we need it rather than sharing just the one.
- And as always a few other new doodads and what nots added into the mix. (Priceless – just kidding they all cost money).
The Adventure!
Just like last time I’m hoping to post to the blog pretty regularly while we’re out (probably on those rest days) so stay tuned if you want to follow along! Although we’ve been planning for a while, this last month has felt extra hectic and has been full of anxiety. I don’t remember feeling so unprepared leading up to the Pacific Coast ride we did a few years back, but hopefully it’s just that we forgot all about that feeling, and the same will hold true for this ride! I mean I did write a whole post about our anxieties last time, and after rereading it I will say, our anxieties this time are very different from those we had previously – I guess we did learn some things.
13 Comments
Anonymous
So jealous! retiring this fall to hopefully do Katy trail in October, and in 2024 the Great Divide Mountain Bike Trail.
Anonymous
Am very excited about your trip. I’ve toured some of the routes and will look at my logs and see ifI have anything to offer.
Geoff and I really enjoyed sharing some of your coast trip!
Vint Ellis
adventurepdx
Have fun out there! I’ve enjoyed my couple bike explorations of Eastern Oregon. It’s been almost ten years since I’ve been out that way, so a visit is overdue. I just wish there was better transit access out that way. I dream of Amtrak bringing back the Pioneer train and being able to get on/off at places like La Grande and Baker City.
Angela
Oh yeah a train out that way would be awesome!!!! …. When we first started planning i was trying to utilize Amtrak, but eventually decided we would prefer riding out in eastern Oregon…. There is a bus (people mover) that goes out that way and says it’ll accommodate bikes but only runs like twice a month on some of the routes and needs advance notice but it’s something i guess.
https://grantcountypeoplemover.com/routes
Bruce Bateau
This sounds like a great adventure. I hope there will be a grand depart, where we can all ride along for the day and see you off!
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