*Motorcycle Roads NorthWest

Puget Sound riders often lament that there’s no good places to go ride that aren’t completely riddled with speed traps, but perhaps what’s needed is a new place to ride.

Manila Creek Road is just such a place. While it’s not 80 miles of uninterrupted twisties like FS25, you’re not going to see much traffic here and you’re not going to see much LEO presence either. And just like the roads around Helens, there’s great roads all over this area where you can turn around and re-do a great set of curves several times without bothering the locals.

View of the Columbia from halfway up the west end:

Like the map indicates below, this road runs up over one of the series of ridges that defines NE Washington. One end is anchored at Route 155 on the the Columbia River a few miles north of Grand Coulee (with a full range of services) and the other end at Route 21 on the Sanpoil River Arm of the the Roosevelt Reservoir, a mere 3-4 miles north of the Keller Ferry. The grades on each end are rather steep as the road climbs out of the valleys, but the plateau at the top is quite nice.

In between the ends, you’ll see some of those sweet twisties that you see so rarely in Western Washington. Smooth, relatively-untravelled, and well-planned turning radii and with good signage.

In all, it’s one of a number of great roads that are scattered all over NorthEast Washington. If you’ve done this road a few times and are bored, you can go hop down through Coulee City and hit the Keller Ferry curves that come up out of the Columbia River Canyon. Or you can cruise up to the roads around Kettle Falls and Republic where you’d be able to ride for days without getting bored of the same old roads. And if that’s too far, you can always make a loop out of the neighboring Cache Creek Road, just a few half-dozen miles or so further north.

The only thing I’d truly caution you on is the occasional deer or cow and bicyclists. It seems that the regional bicycling clubs like this road for some reason.

• Counties: Okanogan, Ferry
• Length: 17 miles
• No Towns on road. Grand Coulee is several miles south of the west end down Route 155.

Google Map:

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Leading out of the Baker City, Oregon Route 86 is the most direct route out to the Hell’s Canyon area. And as one might surmise from the maps of the roadway, it might seem a bit too straight and a bit too flat if one’s gotten spoiled by the Central Oregon roads in the previous day’s riding.

Never fear, however. Route 86 really is the gateway to some awesome riding. It’s gots lots of curves in its own right over on the eastern end as you approach the river, and depending on your nights destination you can take FS 39 up to Joseph or Route 71 past Oxbow and into Central Idaho through Hell’s Canyon.

Either way, it’s really tough to go badly wrong on route selection through here. There’s lot of good riding, quite literally, every way you turn.

Once thing to be mindful of, like much of Eastern Oregon, is the fuel situation for both bikes and riders. There’s precious little civilization in the middle of the road, and services only on each of the ends. The services on the east side are highly dependent on the tourism trade and you should research you “east end” fuel and comestible stops accordingly.

View across the Baker Valley to Oregon’s Elkhorn Range. Taken by Pam Falcioni (Creative Commons)

As the picture above indicates, most of this country is what I generally call “scrub prairie”. Lots of open vistas and short trees.

A couple seasons back, I was given to preferably gas up at the village of Halfway. The gas station operator in Oxbow was reportedly “paranoid” about bikers. Most the ones I know tend to ride around in brightly-colored Goretex with flip-up helmets or whatnot, so it might just be an over-reaction to the nasty press that the cruiser folks sometimes receive.

Also, I’ve heard that there’s a nice little 12-mile route up into the hills northwest of Halfway called the Corcucopia Highway.

If any gets an update to services in Oxbow or that short spur north of Halfway, please do pop in a comment.

View out across the valley. Taken by Marius Strom (Creative Commons)

When you ride through this area, you can almost see the wagon trains coming up the trail. It’s not really changed much since then.

And be sure to watch out for deer. There’s very common along this highway.

• Counties: Baker County, Oregon
• Length: 67 miles
• Towns: Baker City, Richland, Halfway, Oxbow

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As just about any decent map can tell you, 74 runs from a lonely little interchange on I-84 up by the Columbia down through small farm towns and back up to another lonely little interchange just east of Vinson on US Route 395. None of it surprising and none of it very interesting on the surface. And while you can see the big sweeping curves around the bluffs on 74 to the northwest of Heppner and the sharper squiggles to the northeast, the map doesn’t really tell you what you need to know about the highway.

Namely that this road should really be broken down into two parts because they’re quite different roadways.

The northwest leg of Route 74 is best described with: sweeper. Long ones and short ones, all running around 50mph or more. Now don’t get me wrong about them. They’re not bad, but they’re not exhilarating either, since Central Oregon can easily spoil you for fantastic roads. The valley this road runs down is mostly wheat fields and every single square foot of tillable land is planted, which means the road is shoved up against the side of the valley. There’s a few spots with a handful of really nice corners, but they’re not enough to keep a sport rider happy.

And the towns do slow you down, and then back up to speed once you’re though. But unlike your typical wetside drivers that seem to endlessly potter along at 7-under, you won’t see much of that here. There’s so little around that people are obviously going somewhere if you see them out on the road. And they’re usually hauling ass.

I was always flying through the sweepers on this road the couple times I’ve ridden it. The local were moving and obviously far more willing to flirt with the risk of getting a ticket than I.

Concerning that northeast leg of Route 74, well now. It’s a little more interesting. The road is just about completely empty on the Sunday afternoon that I rolled through. I think a saw 3 cars between Vinson and Heppner and was a little wierded by the sudden appearance of dozens of cars once I get into town.

Not to mention that when I got into town, I was suddenly assaulted by a need to instantaneously pull out my dirt riding skills. Inexplicably, the government of city, county, or state, or whatever had decided to rip the entire road out. I rode through a full quarter-mile of deep gravel that far exceeded what any rational road engineer could possibly decide is needed for chip-sealing.

And much like Route 206 out the southwest end of town, 74 has no services between US 395 and Heppner. There’s the usual services in Heppner, but nothing in Vinson except for an old service station that hasn’t sold gas since about World War II.

City of Heppner

One inescapable facet of Route 74 is the wind. I simply could not believe how hard the wind was blowing that Sunday afternoon. It wasn’t like it was all that hot as some rain showers had blown through a few hours previously. It was a consistent 30mph wind with gusts above 45. If it wasn’t for the insane amount of traction on that sharp-edged chip-seal, I probably would have gotten blown off the road and into the weeds.

And regarding getting blown off the road on 74? Well, don’t. This road has much more in the way of twisties than the NW section since it seems to frequently ascend and descend the sides of the ridge that rises to the southeast of Heppner. Serious pucker moments were had when I came around hairpin turns from the lee side of the hill into the teeth of a 45mph gust while trying to power the bike through a 25mph hairpin.

Yes, I still highly recommend this section of the road, but I also highly recommend scheduling it for the morning when it won’t kick your keister quite so hard.

Willow Reservoir Dam

• Counties: Umatilla, Morrow, Gilliam
• Length: 83 miles
• Towns: Heppner, Lexington, Heppner Junction, Cecil, Ione, Vinson

Google Map for Oregon State Route 74:

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Sunrise Park Road
Road to Sunrise Ampitheater

The Road to Sunrise Ampitheatre is extremely twisty and challenging. The paving also leaves a lot of be desired with large frost heaves and sunken sections of pavement. Be quite careful when riding this road due to these concerns and the astonishingly heavy tourist traffic in the afternoons.

However, where the paving is smooth, you’ll find a technically-challenging road with several sharp switchbacks and lovely tight curves. The curves are fairly well-planned, but the road has been sorrowfully neglected recently, and doesn’t appear to get much in the way of preventive maintenance.

The Road up to Sunrise Ampitheater

Do be careful of the turns, as there are rather large drop-offs and no shoulder or guide rails in much of the area.

Above: A Map of Sunrise Park Road

Below: A General Map of Mount Rainier National Park

Additional Photos from my August 2008 trip up to the Sunrise Visitor Center:

Google Map:

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This road provides a excellent path from Ashland to Klamath Falls across the South Oregon Cascades. It’s very scenic and passes by Emigrant Reservoir ascending three 4,000+ foot mountain passes. These fantastic passes include Hayden Mountain 15 miles or so west of Keno.

There are a number of very good roads that intersect with Oregon 66 including Topsy Grade Road (which eventually turns gravel and goes to California) and Dead Indian Road that heads NorthEast out of Ashland near the western terminus of Oregon 66.

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The following in-person report was written by Bandit.PDX during his November 2008 trip.

This week I’m traveling to my southern Oregon offices. So along with the daily work I’m doing for the offices the trip gives me a little scouting opportunity.

Oregon Route 66 runs about 65 miles between Ashland and Klamath Falls. In the expected scheme of things it would land at the end of the end of the first day. So the official opening day of the ride would take us across California from Eureka to I-5 on some twisty mountain roads. Then a bit of breather as we ride up I-5 towards Ashland. Then possibly this 65 mile stretch into Klamath Falls. I say possibly because there are a couple of other routes to get to KFalls if you choose to be different.

After the slab run north to Ashland, OR66 opens with 10 to 15 miles of constant turns. At this stage the road is mostly going up along the face of the hills. In spite of the photos included here most of this section does not have guard rails. In the car I was mostly able to stay between 30 and 40 MPH.

The road surface varies some but it is in good condition. There is a spot right about the 10 mile post where you come around a U curve and it looks like the roadbed slipped a bit, leaving two offset gashes in the right hand lane. The road is lined with red ‘lava stone’ gravel. Even this early in May it was quite clear. Except for some rare spots, if there’s any gravel on the road, it’s on the outer edges. The photos above and below are taken at about the 13.5 mile post, looking back and forward.

This is by far the twistiest part of the route. It goes on like this until about the 20 mile post. Then it mellows out as you decend the back side of the first range of hills.

The landscape is open oak/pine savanna like as you go up the hills. Then turns to pine forest. At least at this time of year, everything was very green and lush. With the spring we’re having, I’d be surprised if it turned brown by the time we pass through. About 30 miles in, OR66 passes through the hamlet of Lincoln, OR. This marks the spot where the road straightens out noticeably. In fact, mile post 30 marks a two mile stretch of straight rolling road. Then there’s a couple of curves as you approach and pass Jenny Creek. Then things go straight again with more sweeping curves through timbered forest.

More sharp turns come as you descend towards the Klamath River crossing. Right at the crossing the road is smooth and silky. But prior to the that pavement is more variable due to wear and tear. There’s an occasional pothole, some cracks. After crossing the Klamath County line going up to the the Parker Mtn. Pass (elev. 4356 ft.) it seemed there was more gravel encroaching on the lane. Not just along the edge, and the occasional spattering along the center lines, but also a bit more in the center of the lane.

It’s also important to remember that you may run into critters both big and small along the road. A deer stepped out into the left lane at 9:44AM. And of course there were the scurrying fuzzy-tailed rodents darting across the road.

The Klamath River crossing is quite picturesque (above) and there is an easy pull-off for a little breather. The rest of OR66 turns into a typical rural byway with a increasing density of residences as you approach KFalls. Soon you enter Keno. This is really the first village with some amenities, such as a gas station maybe a convenient store. But not a lot. So if you are cursed with a small gas tank be sure to check your fuel, and maybe refuel on the west end of the segment in Ashland before starting this segment.

As you travel onward you follow along the Klamath River and its wetlands. This region is rich in bird life. That includes a lot of waterfowl. On my trip I saw some cranes, geese, ducks. I didn’t see any pelicans on this trip, but I have in the past.

To get into the city center of Klamath Falls, you do a little cloverleaf ramp where OR66 meets up with OR140 and 97. Then go a couple of miles then exit right into the west end of town. The Quality Inn is right at the base of the ramp. That’s where I’m writing from…

With the stops for pictures, estimate the OR66 took about 1.5 hours to traverse.

The room I’m in has a jetted tub, a queen bed, a love-seat, chair, desk, small fridge and microwave. The pool is currently closed for repairs, but the front desk expects to be open by the end of the month. It’s a little ragged on the edges (peeling wallpaper in the bath) but clean and usable for a night. And it’s an easy gathering spot before heading up Rt. 97 the next day. And there’s a gas station across the street!

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• Counties: Jackson, Josephine, Klamath
• Length: 64
• Towns: Ashland, Keno, Klamath Falls, Pinehurst

Streets and Trips file for Oregon Route 66 (Ashland-Klamath Falls)

Overview Map:

Google Map:

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