Fatbiking Sandy River Delta

You never know what you'll run into while fatbiking along the Sandy River delta.

Sisters-Old Santiam Wagon Road- McKenzie River

4-day solo bikepacking trip from Sisters, Oregon, across the Old Santiam Wagon Road, to the McKenzie River trail and back. Perfect weather, one cold spring, one hot spring, 6 pinch flats, a bunch of broken equipment and lots of grinning. It was the best bikepacking trip I've ever done.

Partial GPS tracks here

 Leaving Sisters

 The gravel turns red

 The route ran through a section of burned forest...

... and downed trees. Ugh, hike-a-bike

 Mt. Washington through the burn

 Clear Lake- it's actually that blue

 Lava country

 Crazy ass bug

 McKenzie River- one of many crossings like this

Sahalie Falls

One of many technical lava sections

 Look closely on the right, there is a hot springs cave

 

 Another view from Clear Lake

 This section was so cool. Just follow an old trail, nothing packed down and obvious, all old growth trees, lots of lava and nobody in sight

 Shot taken of bug chomped leg the night before the mosquitoes got bad

 High country mountain flowers

 Moonscape- volcanic debris from extinct volcano Sand Mountain

 Last night campsite near Sand Mt

 Old fire lookout tower on top of Sand Mt

 Looking south from Sand Mt looking at Mt Washington and the Three Sisters Mts

 Looking north at Three Fingered Jack and Mt Jefferson

 Looking west, you can see the McKenzie river valley

Good old Karate Monkey!

Dogbikecamping- 3 day

Since Penny the dog is a seasoned traveler on the side of the Big Dummy, I took her out of town 19 miles to the start of the Crown-Zellerbach rail-trail. The C-Z is a 17-mile old logging road that has been recently opened to bike and foot traffic. It's still in a relatively primitive state of gravel, and it leads you from the Columbia River valley to the foot of the Coast Range in the quaint town of Vernonia.

 The Hood variety strawberry stands are a welcomed sight every June in Oregon 

 After 19 miles of pavement, we finally hit the C-Z trail where Penny could run free

 Camp set up for the 1st night. When I woke up the next morning, there was a dog on all fours, standing over me begging to get out and run

 

 Like one giant dog park

 Near the end of the 17-mile long C-Z trail, a momma deer and her fawn burst out of the woods straight at us. While Penny was able to quickly sniff a little fawn butt, she was good and left it alone. Momma deer then stared right at me, stomped her hoof on the ground, and it was time to go

Pup'erroni sticks for her, Hamms for me 

 We both swam about 5 times on day 2

Why this dog loves slingshots is beyond me

 Not even sure what kind of snake this is, but he looks mean

 Penny tore her paw pad, so I had to haul her quite a ways. Obviously, she didn't seem to mind

 Evening #2 camp spot- there was a coyote living nearby, but it left us alone the whole night

 Heading back home on day 3

We rolled back past the strawberry stand on the way home. Super awesome.

Coast Range 3-day

The Velodirt organized Rapture ride is in it's 3rd year now, which is an unsupported all-day jaunt through the Oregon Coast Range. It's a fantastic route, but there are so many other roads I've wanted to check out in the area, so I used the finish line at Flying M ranch for the 2nd night of camping. The goal, like last year, get to the kegs before most people finish the Rapture.

Sorry, no GPS tracks for this one, as I'm pretty sure I was trespassing at some point

Day 1

Leave Portland, de-stress, find cool shit in the woods, don't get too lost.

The trails were looking dense, barely used and promising

Remnants of an old log cabin

While I got turned around a few times and the planned route got changed due to there not actually being a route, the tracks were still pretty good

 This was tamest part of what became a 3-hour bushwhack section

Seriously, this is the trail

 No simple task with a 65 pound bike for almost 3 hours

 Finally made it to the junction of Middle Fork Trask and North Fork Trask rivers for the 1st night of camping

 So good!

Day 2

The left option is North Trask road, part of the Rapture route. The right is Bark Shanty Road, which turned out to be one of the best sections I've ridden in the coast range

 Even the best sections can get regraded for logging trucks. Not CX bike friendly.

 Clearcut- while it's unsightly, this is the reason we have awesome roads to ride in the range. As long as you're camping in designated areas, the logging companies welcome bike traffic and many roads are closed to non-logging motorized vehicles. 

Day 3

I made it to Flying M on day 2 with plenty of beer left in the kegs. The next morning, we're awakened by little airplanes landing in the field next to the campground, whose pilots meet at the ranch for an awesome breakfast that we all share together. After breakfast, I packed up and rolled back to Portland, happy my 1st bikepacking trip of the summer went so well.
  

 Check out the airplane landing in the middle of the image