*Motorcycle Roads NorthWest

I can’t easily recall how many times fellow riders have maligned the US Route highway here in the Pacific Northwest. Too dull, they say. Too slow and no curves, they decry. Try XYZ Road instead of that tired old day. Well, if taken at their word, this (along with the Cascades section of US 20) must be the exception to said ‘rule’. I don’t think it’s really possible to build ANY dull roads right through the heart of the Oregon Coast Range. This one is certainly not it.

I was very pleasantly surprised at the quantity and frequency of 30-40 mph curves on this road. Many rounding the feer of a mountain and diving into and around a riverine horse-shoe bend. Even in truly miserable near-freezing late March weather the curves were technical enough to keep the cagers from crowding me as I tip-toed in to ensure there was no ice mid-corner.

And, yes, there are a number of sections where consturction is rather heavy and the road is being straightened out. Enjoy the twisty parts for they’re only going to be there for a few more years. I find the construction areas were just frequent enough that I enjoyed the curves even more. Even with the ice cold rain.

Interesting scenery:

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Following the Yachats River back up into the Oregon Coastal hills is this eponymous little road. It starts out inside the also eponymous little town of Yachats right off US 101 with a funky uphill and acute-angled intersection that goes right up the side of the hill.

Once you’re a few blocks in and getting outside of the vacation cottages, you notice that this is definitely an adventure road. The elevation changes are as abrupt as the curves and the pavement is patchy in spots where the river has damaged the roadbed. Truly, this road isn’t exactly an engineering marvel like nearby Oregon 34, but it’s a rather enjoyable little road that has a solid 8+ miles of pavement before it goes to gravel.

While the Alsea Highway and Yachats River Road ought to have a lot in common, the nature of state highway vs. county farm road is very apparent. If you ride this road with any aggression, be prepared to bottom out the suspension on the dips and maybe catch a little air coming off the tops.
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This road is an absolute delight. It fully justifies the occasional bragging from my Oregonite friends that the roads down there are far better than Washington’s.

This one is easy to find too. If you’re coming in from the Coast, it’s the main road east out of Waldport. If you’re coming in from West via Corvallis or down from US 20, there’s a little turn-off to the south just west of Philomath.

This road is another that is amazingly empty in the off-season and weekdays. Most of the traffic probably goes up to the US Route to the north and leaves this one of the recreation seekers. On a March Saturday I saw 3-4 cars in an entire hour on the road, not including the guy behind me in the BMW X5 that was hitting the corners even harder than I was and blasting down the straights.

Very typical river view along this road:

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This delightful back-country highway was far nicer than my admittedly low expectations. My cohort and I were hustling along on 223 at a brisk but not unreasonable pace, and enjoying the scenery and sweepers. While this road is certainly no OR47, it has its own charms.

The sweepers are predictable and friendly, with just enough elevation changes and trees to keep things mentally-stimulating. The road is crowned on the straights, but most of the curves are properly banked making it easy to maintain a good clip without worrying about camber. The pavement is reasonably smooth too, while most somewhat-marginal roads are still bowling ball smooth for a V-Strom, my wingman fielded no complaints from atop his ZX-10R either.

The best thing about this road is its status as an amazingly uncluttered alternate to the Route 99 highways or Interstate 5, Unlike so many other routes in Western Oregon and Washington, this thing was just about completely clear. It was scary empty, actually. I don’t think we saw even a dozen oncoming vehicles in 25 miles, and had no problems passing a couple bimbling sport-tourers.
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Everyone that’s persevered sufficiently to read much of my writing knows that I’ve got a thing for old roads. New roads are fun and they’re fast, but they don’t satisfy me unless they have a bit of history behind them.

This one doesn’t sound spectacular, but it’s a great little road that usually gets you away from the weekender traffic putting along 101 and it’s a twisty little beast of a rural backroad that is the current 101′s great-grandpa.

Between Wheeler/Nehalem and the Seaside/Cannon Beach sections of the coast, this used to be the only way to get there. I can’t imagine how horrible the traffic must have been back then, because this little road is seriously twisty. It flips back and forth and goes right up one river valley and down another, and little more than a handful of places with a couple hundred yards of straight stuff.
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