treadnorth: Portland to Cannon Beach Bike Tour...

We got back from Oregon a while ago, but I’m just getting around to posting about it. Summer is cookin’, which means getting outside as much as possible in between workdays, and trying to finish my super late garage projects that should have been done months ago, so I’m slow to post, but that’s become normal here. Thanks for still reading if you’re still here.

The tour was an overall success, and like I mentioned before was Alison’s first real “tour”, and not just an overnighter. I highlighted the general route and plan in the last post, and we did stick to it save for leaving the route for one night in Ft Stevens State Park. We ended up riding from Portland to Cannon Beach over 5 days. We would have easily made it further, however, the spring wet weather that the OR coast is known for wasn’t quite done being wet before the summer transition. We had relatively good weather from Portland to Astoria, and then the skies opened up. We really didn’t see much of the coast due to weather. It wasn’t the first time we got blasted off our plans in the Northwest- Mt St Helens spit of us a couple summers ago with random foul weather that was unseasonable.

The ride from Portland to Astoria was mostly Highway 30 (after leaving the metro area- North Portland was not fun to ride through- I like country roads and scenery, not riding through the hood), and was all marked bike route with light to moderate traffic, save for around Rainier. When we rode through Rainier it was Memorial Day, and it happened to coincide with one of our more pronounced climbs, and the only lack of shoulder on the tour. So, we ended up in heavy traffic, climbing steeply with a tiny gravel/garbage filled shoulder, which sucked and Alison hated. I didn’t really enjoy it myself. Luckily, the route switched back to quieter country stuff with big shoulders thereafter.

Camping the first two nights were in city parks- St. Helens, and Clatskanie, OR. Cheap and comfortable as usual, but not super scenic. City park camping as average I’d say. We ate pretty cheaply too, but did stop for Mexican food in Clatskanie, which was a good choice.

The third night we reached Astoria, and the camping options (that we knew about) consisted of a nasty RV park and riding 15 more miles to Ft. Stevens State Park, and since we had ridden enough for Alison’s liking that day already and were looking for some comfort- we made it a “luxury” tour night with a hotel stay and eating at one of the local brew-houses. Touring doesn’t have to be rough.

The fourth day we had marked as a light day of riding to let new touring legs catch up, and we just rolled down to Ft. Stevens, which has the biggest campground I’ve ever seen. People don’t seem to use tents either due to all the rain- it’s RV country everywhere. There was a hiker/biker section, but it had standing water and tons of mosquitoes, so we opted for a big strip of pavement RV site, and the bugs were way better. We had a good night of camp made Mexican and possibly a nip of whiskey, and rested up nice.

The fifth day, which was to be the start of two days down the coast, met us with lots of water falling from grey skies. We followed the Oregon Coast Bicycle Route until we made it back to the ACA route (we left it to get to Ft Stevens the day before). Until Seaside it was pretty blah- just a moderate traffic highway with not much scenery. But after riding out of Seaside things got pretty, as much as we could see in the funk weather. We made it to Cannon Beach in no time, and really hadn’t ridden much that day, but Alison wasn’t really enjoying the riding with all the rain, so we decided to chill out in Cannon Beach, as it’s a great place to spend some time eating and relaxing. We found some fish and chips with a live bluegrass band that was pretty good, and a place to camp, and the rain even broke for a bit and we took a beach walk out to see Haystack Rock.

The middle of the night then brought pouring rains that would not let up for the remainder of our time out there. Alison doesn’t have the affinity for bicycle suffering that seem to have (she is a normal reasonable person and something is wrong with me J ), so we decided to call the riding done at that point and get a room for the last day to clean up, pack bikes, eat more seafood and be dry. If we had a bigger route and more time for touring, we’d have put up with riding more crummy weather, but seeing as our ride back to Portland was offering to pick us up wherever we happened to be (thanks again Mark!), and the only major goal was to see Alison enjoy her first tour, we thought we may as well quit without suffering. We feel good about the amount of touring we got in.

I do plan on riding more of the coast at some point when I get the time off from work, as it looks like it gets pretty awesome south of Cannon Beach. There is quite a bit of traffic, but good shoulders most of the time, and it’s marked as a bike route whatever that’s worth.

We’re not sure where the next tour is, we’re finishing the garage projects now that I’ve neglected. J We’ll let you know, and for now enjoy the pics of this adventure…

Leaving Mark's in Clackamas...

Crossing the St. John's Bridge in Portland...

Camping in St. Helens (the city park camping was actually better than most places- creekside with showers and it was quiet...)

No pouring rain yet!

Columbia River valleys on the way to the coast...

A lot of areas didn't look incredibly different from MN...

Flowers, wife, and bike...color coordination.

X-Bus! I love the weird crap that presents itself on tours...

Crab enchiladas...

Climbing between Clatskanie and Astoria...I liked this section a lot.

My wife showing she can push a beastly touring bike up a climb above the Columbia...

Had a good rest on top...

Gnat creek...I would have loved to camp here but we hadn't gone very far yet that day- it's a three site State Forest campground that seemed to be geared towards fly-fisherman...very pretty back in there.

Gravel off route at Gnat Creek...

Astoria!

Don't fall in the train tracks on the boardwalk, and slippery when fabulous!

Fresh sea air and cycle-touring...yes please.

You can take a spur route into Washington over this bridge from Astoria and ride to Cape Disappointment State Park over there...looked like it would have been a good time...

Bridge and causeway out of Astoria on the way down to Ft. Stevens...we should have covered some good miles on this day since it was still nice out, but you can't always forecast well...it was a good short day nonetheless...