Bikepacking Tillamook to the Rapture ride

 GPS route- click here

It's officially dirt touring season here in Oregon. The snow has melted below 3,000 feet and the gravel logging roads are open to the coast. With the stellar Velodirt Rapture ride happening this weekend, we opted to load up and take the long way from Portland to the Rapture start/finish at Flying M Ranch.

Avenging my first taste of bikepacking in the Tillamook forest from two years ago, I really wanted to complete the route from Gales Creek to Browns Camp, this time actually knowing where I was going. With better mapping skills and a GPS with routes plotted in advance, I was surely not going to get lost. Or at least, not as lost as last time. 

Day 1- Portland to Horse Camp

Cheever and I loaded up and rolled to the lightrail station Friday morning. The lightrail ride is a fantastic way to get you through the stupid suburbs. From Hillsboro, we pedaled 15 miles to Gales Creek Tavern, which marked the end of pavement for the next 60+ miles and a welcomed lunch spot. The part that sucked was the tavern was closed. Or perhaps this was a blessing, as we surely would've installed several beers into our legs before the huge hike up into the coast range.

 Tavern closed = trail mix for lunch

First signs of gravel and slugs on Old Wilson Road

I warned Cheever about pushing our bikes, and within a few miles of the tavern, that's exactly what we were doing. Bikepacking isn't glamorous or fast, but you get to experience the outdoors in places where all the race nerds never go. It's easy to stop and look around, or lay down and have a sip of whiskey along the way.

Fuzzy caterpillar

From here along Old Wilson road, we rode and walked our bikes up several miles, took a few dead end roads, tried hike-a-biking through some clear cut debris, and finally gave in to following the power lines towards Browns Camp

Much trickier on a loaded 60-pound bike.Once we got to this spot, I knew where we were. Scoggins road was a quick 2-mile ride on the relatively easy gravel road, and it would take us directly to Browns Camp

 Some rolly dirt mounds looked deliberately placed here to keep trucks off this road

 University Falls road

 Whack-a-Mole

We had passed Browns Camp and University Falls, were feeling fatigued and started looking for a camping spot. In my mind, I wanted to go a bit further. But we came upon a ridge and saw some wet weather coming our way. We opted to check out this horse camp as a potential home for the night.

 Hmmm, big shelter, picnic tables, fire pits, outdoor toilets and a stream nearby. Perfect. Apparently equestrians haven't come out for the season because we had the entire campground to ourselves. Even the abundant motorcycles and ATVs in the area were not allowed in the horse camp.

 Time for dry sausage, whiskey...

 ...and the slingshot

It took us about 45 minutes, but we finally got a fire started with all the damp wood. The ironic thing is- by the time we'd put all that work into making the fire and drank most of our booze stash doing so, we were pretty much warm and ready for bed. But before bed, we walked through the woods to a clearing and watched the "supermoon" shine through the quickly passing clouds. It was to be full the next night, but was already plenty bright

 Day 2- Horse Camp to Flying M Ranch

 

 We started the day with a nice long gravel downhill

 This bridge was specifically built for motos to link the vast array of OHV trails. When you're at a river, you know you have a climb ahead of you. We just didn't know it was going to be a 2,000 foot climb up C-Line and Lyda roads.

These moto trails are not very bikepacking worthy. It's hard to see how steep it is from a photo, but it's probably close to a 40% grade as far as we could see through the woods

 Fortunately, we had plenty of gravel roads under 15% grade to ride up...

 and up...

... until we hit several snow patches near Timbuktu. Seriously, there is a dot on the forest map to indicate Timbuktu, but I challenge anybody to find some form of establishment or past encampments.

 More moto trails through the clearcut

Once we topped out around 3,000 feet, it was chilly and Williams road had been regraded with chunky gravel. 29" x 2.1" tires were the perfect medium for the whole trip

 Williams road leads from Timbuktu, winds around a long ridge and eventually drops us down to North Trask River road, which is part of the Rapture course

 Most of the Tillamook State forest is a tree farm. While it takes from the beauty, you have to understand that paper products come from somewhere, and these roads wouldn't exist without them. I'm just thankful the logging/paper companies who operate the land allow use of bicycles, often times on roads where other motorized traffic isn't allowed

 

This waterfall was about 30-40 feet tall

 The goal for the day was to make it back to Flying M Ranch, where the Rapture ride was finishing up. Since we ran out of whiskey, we were motivated to get to the keg before it started floating in the ice bucket. After dropping from Williams road to N. Trask River road near Barney Reservoir, we started seeing some signs of civilization, and lycra

 Our only elk spotting of the weekend, just a few miles shy of Flying M Ranch

 A creepy clown pinata greeted us at Flying M Ranch. It was Cinco de Mayo, afterall. Beer, food, fire, camp, laugh, sleep

Day 3- Flying M Ranch to home

 After breakfast was served at Flying M Ranch, 5 of us rolled down Railroad Grade road towards the lightrail station in Hillsboro that would take us home. One more gravel descent down Mt. Richmond road and I hit my gravel road record (on a loaded bike), 40.7 MPH.

 Pit stop for fried food and Hamms

We boarded the lightrail in Hillsboro to take us into Portland. With one last stop at the historic Goose Hollow Tavern for lunch and beers, I realized how dirty I was. The socks on my feet and the shirt on my back hadn't been removed for 3 days. The satisfaction of knowing the off-road route to Browns Camp,  living outside for the entire weekend, and seeing more of the Tillamook state forest was all that really mattered.

Full Moonlander

 Seaside to Warrenton GPS ride profile- click here

Day 1-

With the arrival of a bouncing baby Moonlander to the family, and a newborn bundle of joy to Mr. Ahearne's family, it was time for a playdate on the beach. Lucky for us, not only did the spring weather look promising, but it was also a full moon.

We rolled out of town on the bus to the coastal town of Seaside. For $17, we can slide our bikes underneath in the cargo bay and let somebody else drive 2 hours through the Oregon coast range. After driving through a 10 minute snowstorm over one of the passes, the bus dropped us off at the Seaside hostel at sunset, which is run by a rad woman named Trung. For another $26, we get beds in a dorm and free pancakes and eggs in the morning. They have secure bike parking, fresh made coffee and the usual hostel amenities. We were the only other tenants that night, so we stayed out late, knowing we wouldn't wake anybody when we got back.

Bark at the Moon- we hit the beach after the sun went down. As soon as we got out towards the water, we saw the moon creep up over the mountains. There was no need for lights, we had natural moon light beaming from space. We rolled to the south edge of the beach to a dead end, then found a nice log to sit on and drink a beer.

Post-beer, we headed north until a river dead ended the short beach and we got into some thick swamp brush and peanut buttery mud/sand. After a few moments of 'shwacking through the weeds, we found a recently abandoned camp fire and stoked it up to warm our feet. Joseph pulled one of the two flasks of whiskey from his bike to warm our bellies. There were still sea lions in the river.

The best part of the night was yet to come- as we found our way back towards the hostel, we rolled into the beach grass and followed some of the singletrack-like foot paths through the grass. The paths all seemed intertwined, so we'd just follow one, then split off and ride another, then another, and so on. It was a seemingly endless little maze of footpaths to try and hold your line on. And if you veered off the path, the massive tires made up for it and plowed right through anything. It was a surreal moment to be able to ride without lights, at speed, on beach singletrack. After that, we tested the stair climbing abilities of our bikes and rolled back to the hostel to turn in for the night.


Day 2-


With the unexpected bonus of last nights excellent ride, we woke up with the realization that all we needed to worry about today was to eat, ride, shit and catch a bus back to Portland in 10 hours. Trung mades us some coffee and we walked outside to the river in front of the hostel and noticed frost on the ground. But despite the chilly night, we could tell the sun was warming things up quickly.

4 1/2 eggs (each) and a massive pancake (each) later, we packed our crap and rolled out of Seaside north to drop onto the beach in Gearhart, right on the other side of the river where we warmed our feet over the fire the night before.

It was sunny and warm already- a perfect day was shaping up. Within minutes, I broke a bottle cage, Joseph lost a water bottle and our feet were wet from plunging through a creek. These turned out to be the only casualties of the day. After a couple miles of swerving, grinning and chasing up birds, we went back into Gearhart to buy sandwiches, pie, chocolate and beer for lunch.

Back on the beach, we just rolled and observed. There were more dead crabs on the beach than I'd ever seen. Some of them looked intact and alive, so we got some good close-ups shots, showing their purple color and bad ass stature. Crabs are cool. The sea gulls and other birds were having smorgasbord, which made it fun to ride over to them and spook them into flight. This never got old.

We took a lunch down the beach at about mile 13. Croissant sandwich and a cold 24oz Rainier, kept icy cold thanks to this wonderful multi-use bag from Randi Jo Fabrications. One of the nice conveniences of Oregon beach rides is the proximity to small towns with food, water and beer. You're usually never more than 5 miles between towns, so you don't need to load down your bike with too much stuff.

We arrived at the old shipwreck of the Peter Iredale. The remains of the wreckage are the rusted steel beams from the bow, and one little beam of the tail about a 150 behind it. As if planned, a surfer caught a wave as I snapped the photo.

The further north we got, the more we felt our legs fatigue. We also went from relatively fast sand and a 12 MPH clip, to a more dirt mix of sand and a slower 8-9 MPH clip. It seemed like we arrived at the northern most end of the beach is short time, but 5 hours had gone by like nothing.

As far as scenery goes, this mound on the beach is probably one of the most amazing geographical spots on the planet. The mouth of the mighty Columbia river lets out into the Pacific ocean. As you look up the Columbia, a snow white Mt. St. Helens pops up in contrast with the 1,000-3,000 foot hills in the foreground. Then there are the beach dunes and cliffs across the river on the Washington state side. Words can't describe it, nor do photos fully capture it. You just have to go there, preferably by bike.

 

Ripping some beach singletrack

 

A 360 view of the northwest-most part of Oregon, where the Columbia meets the Pacific

 We weren't done riding yet, as we opted to wrap around the peninsula to see how far inland we could ride. This was the most peanut buttery section of sand on the day, with a head wind to boot. At one point, the beach disappeared into the waves of the brackish Columbia, but we were able to ride through the 100 yard section until the beach reappeared again. Mud, bogs, grass, sand and migrant birds made up the last section of beach for the day, and it was finally time to head back into Warrenton.

Hitting pavement for the first time in 7 hours felt pretty good. We pumped the tires up from 12-15 PSI to about 22, perfect for pavement. We zig zagged in and out some bike paths and into the town of Warrenton, where the bus would pick us up. Corn dogs, Snickers bars, another beer and a quick bird bath in the bathrooms was all I needed before the bus ride. I got home 29 hours after I left.

Fat bikes are further proof you don't have to go fast or far to have a great day.