Bikepacking Overnight: Klickatat Maryhill Loops (Not Recommended)

While I have gotten pretty good at route planning, sometimes, I get the intel wrong for all my best intentions and research. I am posting this SOLELY because I did not find much on the private property closure on the top of Maryhill Loops and I had seen other trip reports where people minimized the risks of trespassing.

Ani and I were craving Spring Columbia River Gorge wildflowers and the Klickitat trail was also on our bucket list. So off we went. We braved 25+ mph headwinds, 14% grades, and navigated some challenging conditions.

This is a route that I would NOT recommend as designed for several reasons. Trespassing at the top of Maryhill loops have clearly become an issue. The residents have put up a lot of signage and we did not feel comfortable with others who decided to just jump the gate. 

If I had to do this again, I would camp at the Maryhill State Park and do the Maryhill loops as a day ride and not incorporate it into a bikepacking trip. I'd also be curious to re-route this counter-clockwise and find a different way to do the loop!

Some gnarly doubletrack straight up a hill.

Gorgeous views!

Peak flower season on the Gorge!

We got to push this button on the road to go through the tunnel... its a take the lane situation sharing with cars.

Klickitat trail joy!

Our sweet dispersed campsite right on the water. Our neighbor? A goat. Like the guy brought his goat out camping.

Maryhill loops!

A few tips for cycle tourists:

• The Canyon Market in Klickitat is a gem and the staff were super nice!
• From what we could tell by other cyclists we saw, people tended to ride the Klickitat trail the opposite way we did.
• While the wildflowers in the Gorge in April are magical, holy crap the wind is not to be f*cked with!
  
• We camped out Friday night at the Deschutes Recreation Site (one of our favorites), and then did the mad dash on the highway over the river. It also has free parking vs paid parking at Maryhill State Park.
• If you do want to bike Maryhill loops, check out their website to make sure it isn't closed for a special event (e.g. they do a longboarding event there!) - https://www.maryhillmuseum.org/outside/historic-maryhill-loops-road. 

Olympic Peninsula Circumnavigation

"GCOR is a circumnavigation of the Olympic mountain range primarily using the gravel roads of the Olympic National Forest, DNR and state forests land. It is 440 miles of beautiful, remote and varied forest land. They’re not easy miles either! There are 7 major climbs over 2000′; 40,000′ of elevation total." - GCOR race page.

My friend Elisa and I had blocked out 9 days at the end of July for a longer bikepacking trip TBD. It would be her longest bikepacking trip ever and in her own words, she hadn't been riding much and so wanted to make sure we didn't have too much climbing each day. So of course, she sent me the GCOR route as a potential trip idea. While I initially had been eyeballing another bikepacking trip on Vancouver Island, I was intrigued by the idea of exploring the Olympic peninsula since it was new to me. I accepted the challenge to figure out a less gnarly version of GCOR, and this is what we ended up with. 

We loved everything that was NOT on the 101, so if I had to do this again with more time, I'd probably add back in a few of the gravel road sections that didn't involve gratuitous climbing. I'd also prolly try not to do it in a heatwave again, too. But that all said, we had an amazing time and I'd do it all again!

Dispersed camping in the rainforest.

Remote gravel roads for days.

Uh, this is the turnoff!?

Lake Crescent afternoon dip post-ice cream bars from the lodge.

Hiker-biker campsites are the best!

Sequim Bay at sunset.

Morning views from the tent.

Proof we had 30 minutes of clouds.

We love random farm stands so much!

Roads less travelled.

Forks fame.

Car free joy!

More car free joy!

So many hand pies!

A few tips for bike tourists:

• We parked our car for a small fee at the Dow Creek RV Resort... it's not something they typically do, but it made for a perfect starting point as we stayed the first night there after a long drive to prep and we also enjoyed showers at the end!
• Washington State Parks have hiker/biker sites (even if not immediately apparent on the website) and in our experience, they were never full. A ranger told us that there is an official policy that they cannot turn away someone arriving on foot or bicycle.
• Other than the initial part of the route from the Dow Creek RV Resort to Spider Lake to Lake Quinault, there are plentiful resupply spots. The Shell station in Forks (which houses Ron's Food Mart) has a suprisingly good selection of single serving foods that are easy to grab and go for a bikepacking trip. But the real winners were the North Shore Grocery near Lake Quinault (owned by an Asian family with a surprisingly good selection of random Asian goodies) and the store in Quilcene (a gem with homemade tamales, fresh baked goods, a dozen types of hand pies, and everything in between).
• You cannot depend on small cafes on this route to be reliably open... with staffing issues and other potential pitfalls, it's good to have a back up plan!
• Farm stands also dot this route, especially along the west and north part of the route.
• The Olympic Discovery Trail is an amazing car-free experience!

Bikepacking Overnight: Cascade Locks to Vancouver Lake and Back Again

Weekend getaways can be tricky in the summer with my partner because he travels a lot for work, especially during the summer. Normally I enjoy having a few weeks to myself here and there because, while he loves bikes, he doesn't bike tour. His time away means I can immerse myself in my ever-growing list of weekend bike tours. His passion is racing his Laser sailboat, and so when he gets the rare week or two in free, he tries to balance sailing with spending time with me. We've found a pretty great balance of our two different passions... last year, we road tripped to Vancouver, Canada together and then I set off on a solo bikepacking tour of Vancouver Island while he raced his boat in a multi-day regatta.

I realized that was the best way for us to adventure together; I would find little bike tours either meeting him where his regattas take place, or doing a loop from the regatta itself. So when he had his eye on a regatta at Vancouver Lake, WA, I starting scouring routes, from the American Adventure Cycling Assocation's Lewis and Clark Trail, to various routes on Ride with GPS. Since it was a short regatta, just two days, I decided to start out at Cascade Locks and meet him at the regatta to camp out with him in Spacevan Spiff, his 1994 Toyota Previa converted into a camper van.

First things first, picked up a little snack from the native fish market in Cascade Locks... packed some smoked sockeye in my handlebar bag with some ice!

Hikers, bikers, and cars all manage to share this iconic bridge.

It was hot with a lovely headwind that made it feel not-so-hot, but which also made the flats feel like way more work than they needed to be. I was happy to refill my bottles at Beacon Rock which had a water spigot just off Highway 14. Since it was a sunny gorgeous Saturday, everyone was out, including fast sports cars that liked to whiz by me just a little too fast. At the first chance I got, I took a detour to get away from the traffic onto lovely empty roads. Honestly, Highway 14 isn't particularly travelled in comparison to other state highways, but the second you get off it, the roads are a bike tourists dream... traffic free and the few vehicles that do travel on them are going at a leisurely safe speed.

Bucolic farmland as I detoured off Washington state Highway 14 to get away from the weekend warrior traffic.

Flowers EVERYWHERE!

Thanks Google Maps, this is most definitely NOT a bike path... but it did lead to a greenway, so I'll forgive you.

I wound my way through Washougal and Camas and connected to the Evergreen Highway, a low traffic road that runs right along the Columbia River to make my way to Vancouver and up to the Vancouver Lake. While not necessarily the smoothest pavement I've ever ridden, the joy of riding without traffic made up for it. David had left the van door open with a cooler full of cold beers, which I took full advantage of.

Made it to Vancouver Lake and enjoyed the sunset.

After a pleasant evening enjoying the group dinner the Vancouver Lake Sailing Club put on and otherwise eating all the things, we curled up in the Spacevan and passed out. The next morning, we made breakfast to cooler skies and calm seas. David had explored the area a bit since he arrived a day earlier than I did, and recommended I check out the Burnt Bridge Creek Greenyway, a lovely car-free greenway that started near Vancouver Lake and cross the whole city. It was a lovely ride and then I connected back to Highway 14... with less traffic, I decided to crush it back to the car and forgo then less travelled detours. 

Found another greenway just a hop and a skip away from Vancouver Lake to head back to my car. I can't stress how important and amazing greenways are for a city. I was able to ride on this greenway for 45 minutes to cross the bulk of Vancouver... no cars, just lots of happy cyclists and pedestrians.

Sometimes staying on the more-travelled road leads to gorgeous views like the one here at Cape Horn viewpoint.

I made it back in good time, shaving an hour off my saddle time from the day before. It just goes to show that bike tours don't have to be complicated affairs. I might have otherwise just ridden up with David in the van, but why do that when I can kill two birds with one stone?

A few tips for cycle tourists:

• Cascade Locks has plenty of on-street parking on the main stretch to leave a car overnight. Some research had shown a hiker's forum that said the folks at City Hall said that cars can be parked for 48 hours and possibly more since there is no local law enforcement to ticket or tow. I chatted with a woman at the local gas station and she told me my car would be fine overnight so long as I didn't have anything in it that might attract someone to break in. 

• If I had to do this again with all the time in the world, take the detour just after Prindle into Washougal both ways, find the most direct route up to the Burnt Bridge Creek Greenway, and then coast into Vancouver Lake. 

• There are plenty of places to get water and food along the way. In the hot summer months, the 50+ miles can still require 2+ liters of water, especially with the strong winds coming off the Columbia River.