Northwest Loop

Northwest Loop

via bicycle from Portland, OR into Idaho and back to Portland

July 31 - August 30, 2009

Introduction & Sightseeing in Portland Is Below

There will be links you can click on for additional information, and the trip will be divided into sections so it will load faster on dial-up modems. I will also only include small thumbnails of my pictures on the main page so it will load faster and you can see a larger picture if you wish my clicking on the thumbnail (see the directions below).

week 1

August 1 - 7

Portland to Dayton, WA

291 miles

week 2

August 8 - 14

Dayton, WA to Halfway, OR

377 miles

week 3

August 15 - 21

Halfway to Sisters, OR

296 miles

week 4

August 22 - 29

Sisters to Portland, OR

436.8 miles

pictures

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me on my Lightning R-84 -- a super light dual-suspension carbon fiber bicycle with a 3-pound frame made of aerospace grade carbon fiber, titanium, and oversized aluminum

Map of the Northwest Loop

This new WomanTours tour includes the Columbia River Valley of Oregon and Washington, the Seven Devils Range of Idaho and the Pacific Coast of Oregon.

We begin the tour in Portland, Oregon, considered to be one of the most bicycle friendly cities in America. It is full of bike paths and boutique bike-building companies, so we were encouraged to arrive early to explore the town on our own. The tour begins with a general meeting, a fix-a-flat workshop and a send-off banquet on the first evening.

We leave Portland early the next morning on a bike path and head east through the Columbia River Gorge, heading backwards and we hope — with the wind at our backs — along the Lewis & Clark Trail. We cross the river into the state of Washington on our 5th riding day and stay in Washington until we reach the Idaho border 3 days later. Then we stay overnight in Lewiston, ID at the confluence of the Snake and Clearwater Rivers.

Next we head south picking up the TransAmerica Trail designed by the Adventure Cycling organization. We bike through the Nez Perce and Payette National Forests and into the Hells Canyon area. Then we cross back into Oregon heading west through the Umatilla National Forest.

Gold was discovered in eastern Oregon and brought the first settlers to the area during the mid-1800s. We’ll bike through many former boom towns – some prospered while others have withered over time. We cross the Cascades into the beautiful Willamette Valley before we head over to the Pacific Coast.

We head north along the coast to Astoria, where we pick up the end of the Lewis & Clark Trail. Then we cap off the tour with a celebratory century ride of 100 miles. What a wonderful way to finish our month-long accomplishment!

We will be riding our bikes 24 days and have 5 rest days during the tour. A daily itinerary with the miles we ride and the city we stay in each night is shown below. Notice that our rest days during the ride are in Walla Walla, WA; New Meadows, ID; John Day, OR; Sisters, OR; and Manzanita, OR.

the specific stopover towns and mileages are subject to change

Date

Location

Miles

Lodging

WiFi

July 31

Portland, OR

0

Marriott Portland - Downtown Waterfront

yes

            Week 1

August 1

Troutdale, OR

23

Holiday Inn Express

yes

August 2

Hood River, OR

54

Hood River Inn

yes

August 3

Biggs Junction, OR

45

Biggs Travelodge

yes

August 4

Umatilla, OR

88

Desert River Inn

yes

August 5

Walla Walla, WA

53

Best Western Walla Walla - Suites Inn

yes

August 6

Walla Walla, WA

0

same

yes

August 7

Dayton, WA

29

Weinhard Hotel, or Purple House B&B, or McCann Manor

only the Weinhard

       Week 2

August 8

Lewiston, ID

69

Comfort Inn

yes

August 9

Kamiah, ID

91

Lewis-Clark Resort

yes

August 10

White Bird, ID

49

White Bird Motel or Hoots Cafe & Motel

August 11

New Meadow, ID

63

Hartland Inn B&B & Motel

yes

August 12

New Meadows, ID

0

same

yes

August 13

Cambridge, ID

47

Frontier Motel

yes

August 14

Halfway, OR

58

Halfway Motel

       Week 3

August 15

Baker City, OR

55

Bridge Street Inn

yes

August 16

John Day, OR

80

Best Western John Day Inn

yes

August 17

John Day, OR

0

same

yes

August 18

Mitchell, OR

69

Oregon Hotel or Little Pine Lodge, or Sky Hook Motel

only Oregon Hotel & Sky Hook

August 19

Prineville, OR

47

Stafford Inn

yes

August 20

Sisters, OR

43

Best Western Ponderosa

yes

August 21

Sisters, OR

0

same

yes

        Week 4

August 22

Blue River, OR

46

Harbick's Country Inn or Holiday Farm Resort

August 23

Eugene, OR

55

Red Lion Hotel

yes

August 24

Corvallis, OR

41

EconoLodge

yes

August 25

Neskowin, OR

81

Grey Fox Vacation Rentals

DSL

August 26

Manzanita, OR

71

Sunset Surf Oceanfront Motel

yes

August 27

Manzanita, OR

0

same

yes

August 28

Astoria, OR

44

Holiday Inn Express

yes

August 29

Portland, OR

100

Marriott Portland - Downtown Waterfront

yes

August 30

Shuttle to Airport

    or

start driving home

This map was developed on Google, and each bicycle represents one of our overnight stays starting at Portland and moving eastward through Oregon, through the SE corner of Washington, a little eastward then south through Idaho, then west and a little north back to the coast and finally east and south back to Portland.

There are 29 women involved in this 29 day adventure. This total includes 2 Woman Tour guides and 4 woman who will share the job of driving the sag vehicle. We stay in motels with beds and hot showers every night.

I plan to drive from Terre Haute to Portland so I can stop and visit my brother and his wife in Lincoln, NE, and take my bike with me instead of boxing it up and shipping it. The 2nd row of seats in my Pontiac Torrent fold flat and I can lay my bike down across the seats and have room for my luggage. I will stay with a friend for two nights in Portland and then move into the Portland Marriott Downtown Waterfront to join the WomanTours group.

We will have an orientation meeting at 1 pm, a bike set-up meeting at 3:30, and a reception and opening banquet at 6 in the Marriott banquet room. Since I don't need to go to the bike setup meeting as my bike did not arrive boxed up, I have a couple of hours to work on my computer and on my luggage between the orientation meeting and the banquet.

Below are several pictures from my tour of Portland.

the Portland Marriott Downtown Waterfront Motel

(picture above & location below)

one of the 4 bridges over the Willamette River in Portland - this one carries I5 and 405

tram going up to the OHSU Hospital

view of the Portland skyline from the OHSU Hospital

the Oregon seal

Portlandia is a sculpture located above the entrance of Michael Graves' Portland Building in downtown Portland. It is the second-largest copper repoussé statue in the United States, after the Statue of Liberty. The statue is based on the design of the city seal and depicts a woman dressed in classical clothes, holding a trident in the left hand and reaching down with the right hand to greet visitors to the building. The statue is 36 feet high. If standing, the woman would be about 50 feet high.

In 1883, Portland entrepreneur and banker William Sargeant Ladd built an elaborate Carriage House. Over 100 years later the future of the building was cast into doubt when the neighboring First Christian Church announced plans to redevelop the entire block. The congregation had bought the Ladd Carriage House in 1971, and sought to expand parking for its members. As part of the redevelopment, a condo tower, Ladd Tower, would be built above a parking garage. This raised alarm bells in the preservationist community and a grass-roots campaign, the Friends of Ladd Carriage House, sprang into action to either save or move the old building. A compromise was agreed upon where the Ladd Carriage House would be moved temporarily while a new garage would be dug out, then the building would be moved back onto the lot. The plans for the condo tower were scaled back so that the tower's footprint only took up half the block, not three-quarters of it.

Completed in 1970, this fountain was originally called the Forecourt Fountain. In 1978, it was renamed after Ira C. Keller, a local civic leader and chairman of the Portland Development Commission, for his extensive efforts in revitalizing the South Auditorium area. This fountain is truly one of a kind. Dreamed up with Oregon's Cascade Mountain waterfalls in mind, the Keller fountain holds 75,000 gallons of water and pumps about 13,000 gallons of water per minute through its terraces and platforms.

By 1905 Portland had 200 miles of rose-bordered streets and came to be known as the 'City of Roses.' In 1915 Jesse A. Currey, rose hobbyist and Sunday editor of the Oregon Journal, convinced city officials to institute a rose test garden to serve as a safe haven during World War I for hybrid roses grown in Europe. The efforts of a group of civic-minded citizens led to the establishment of the International Rose Test Garden in 1917.

In 1919 the city of Portland issued its first annual Gold Medal Award to the best new rose variety introductions. Another award, called Portland’s Best Rose, was established in 1996. Rose experts from around the world attend a one-day judging in June and select the best rose that day from thousands of submissions. Portland remains the only North American city to issue such awards.

Featuring over 6,800 rose bushes representing 557 varieties, the International Rose Test Garden received The Garden of Excellence Award from the World Federation of Rose Societies in 2006.

Portland is very bike friendly and has bike racks and storage space everywhere.

Portland has a lot of unusual sculptures and there were 4 like this one -- all in different colors -- in the same block.

The Coming of the White Man Statue – This bronze statue completed in 1904 symbolizes “the white man’s invasion of the wilderness, home of the Indians.” Facing eastward, two Indians look down upon ox teams bringing settlers to Oregon. One of the Indians is Chief Multnomah of the Multnomah tribe.

Sacajawea Statue – Sacajawea was a Shoshone woman who traveled with her French husband with Lewis & Clark and helped the party by translating and negotiating with the Shoshone. However, her greatest value to the mission may have been simply her presence, which indicated their peaceful intent. Clark noted "The Indian woman confirmed those people of our friendly intentions, as no woman ever accompanies a war party of Indians in this quarter" and "the wife of Shabono our interpetr we find reconsiles all the Indians, as to our freindly intentions a woman with a party of men is a token of peace."

President Theodore Roosevelt laid the first stone in the base of this statue in 1903. The bronze statue was unveiled in 1905 at the Lewis and Clark Exposition and was the first statue in America featuring a woman.