| Name: | Deschutes River trail | 
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| Description: | A quick ride on the drive from Boise to Portland that turned out to be a bit longer than expected. The plan was to do some ride on the way since I was not too keen on just spending the whole day driving. After playing with Google Maps to find some decent road which had lower chance of rain (a storm was supposed to pass through during the day), I found the Deschutes River Trail which is a dirt trail that follows an old railroad on the east side of the Deschutes river from its estuary to about 17 miles upstream. I pulled at the parking lot at the trailhead around noon at a brisk 40 F and partly cloudy skies, I crossed the storm about an hour to the east. It was fairly breezy and it looked like it may sprinkle so I put on my dry weather winter gear and put rain jacket and pants in the backpack. The first half of the trail was not too bad, the surface was a fine gravel which had just occasional bigger rocks and bumps. The only drawback was the cold. The trail got rougher more south and at the terminus caused by a few collapsed bridges I was swearing at the maintenance (or the lack thereof). I also had a small rain shower which came right at the time I was passing a good tree under which I stood for about 15 min waiting out the rain. The ride back was a bit rougher since I was facing a cold northerly headwind, but, I made it back to the trailhead at about 4:15, not too long before it started getting dark. Overall, not too bad of a trail but the surface is fairly rough at the end so the whole thing is more for die hards. I am not sure if I would be riding this one again, once in a lifetime is probably enough. | |
| URL: | TopoFusion Home Page | |
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| Total Distance: | 37.62 miles (60.54 km) |
| Total Trip Time: | 3:41:18 (3:16:33 moving time) |
| Total Climbing: | 1187 feet (362 m) |
| Total Descending: | 1284 feet (391 m) |
| Average Speed: | 11.48 mph (18.48 kph) |
