TBatty

My wife and I are planning our first DIY tour for this fall, the Oregon Coast Bike Rout. We have done a number of long day rides, supported overnight (STP) and fully supported tours (Cycle Oregon), now we want to to strike out on our own.

We don't have "touring" bikes set up for racks and panniers, so will probably do something close to a credit card tour, maybe camp but eat from restaurants.

we have 10 days to do this, so that means a one-way trip, north to south. Any suggestions for getting back to the start? We will probably find a place to park the car in Astoria, or with a friend in Scappoose and add a day of riding.

Any suggestions or words of wisdom about this rout?

thanks in advance.

vegenaise

misspelling route three times. wow.

anyway, imho the oregon coast isn't all it's cracked up to be. crappy shoulders, tons of traffic, sub par landscapes. i've cycled much nicer coastlines. perhaps if you're from iowa or some other equally ugly state i guess.

edit for more points. the best part of the oregon coast is leaving oregon and then immediately going to jedediah smith redwood state park. prior to the redwoods, that part of california is super ugly though. as for getting back the train from southern oregon to portland goes through the mountains and is really beautiful. you'd have to take a bus to get from pdx to astoria.

JimT

The Oregon Coast would be a great route for a credit card tour. Lots on campgrounds, resturants, and motels spaced along the way. The Oregon Coast is beautiful, especially the middle and southern part. You mentioned travelling in the fall. The week after Labor Day is a great time to travel the coast. School has started, so the summer folks are gone and the fall folks haven't come out in force yet.
Depending on how far down you were able to get, would determine how difficult it would be to get back.

Regards, Jim

screenwasher

You can order a free copy of the Oregon Coast biking map here: https://www.oregon.gov/ODOT/HWY/BIKEP...T_Bicycle_Maps

Several of the state campsites along the Oregon coast have yurts. https://www.oregon.gov/OPRD/PARKS/cabins.shtml
You will have to reserve these ahead of time, but it will save you having to carry a tent and sleeping bags and give you a lot more elbow room than a tent. You could more or less plan a daily yurt to yurt ride all along the 400 mile coast route. Cost is typically $27-30 per night.

I am more in tune with the comments of JimT about the Oregon coast. You can form an independent opinion of this route by searching this forum and crazyguyonabike for the touring experiences of others. Nothing like riding it yourself though.

JimT

Here's another thought. Have you thought about doing a loop ride starting at your friends in Scappoose? There's some great possibilities for getting from Scappoose to the coast, then down the coast a ways and back. If you have an idea about how many miles you might want to do in a day, I'd be happy to explore route options for you.

Jim

jimx200

Well you're certainly the sanctimonious one chastising the OP for misspelling a word. Especially in light of your pee poor sentence structure, words that need to be capitalized, and missing comas. Sorry, you are not smarter than a 5th grader!

Doug64

Spelling and sentence structure aside, and contrary to some opinions; the Oregon Coast has relatively good road shoulders and is very scenic. I lived there, driven over there hundreds of times, and have ridden it twice. Hell yes, I'm biased! We've riden Highway 101 from Lund, BC to Crescent City, CA. The Oregon segment has the best ocean scenery. We had to bail out when we were a getting close to CA due to a family emergency. A couple of days riding put us in Crescent City where we were able to rent a car at the Crescent City Airport. We returned it at the Eugene Airport, but I suspect that it could have been returned at any Hertz Car Rental. There is no direct rail service until you get to San Francisco. Some of the larger cities have bus service to the Amtrak station in towns like Redding.

P.S. While not riding Highway 101 and Highway 1 south of Crescent City, I have driven them. The shoulders and traffic get worse the farther south you go. Actually rideable shoulders are non-existent in a lot of the areas. Granted, the redwoods are unique, but they are a very small part of CA. Also, Oregon also has one of the best State Park systems of any state or country I've riden in.

P.S.S. I've also cycled across Nebraska and Iowa, and they are great places to ride! We stayed off the AC routes and found the small towns interesting and the people great. Actually, on our cross country trip a couple of years ago Nebraska (another "boring" state) was one of the places we talked about going back to for more exploring.

Enjoy your tour, and if you have any specific questiona PM me.

kayakdiver

BigBlueToe

I've ridden the Oregon coast twice. I did it first as part of a Seattle-to-Santa Cruz, west coast ride. I liked the Oregon coast so much I went back several years later and rode from Portland to Astoria, and down to Crescent City. I think it's a great place to tour. You meet tons of other bike tourers, the camping is wonderful - hiker/biker sites all along the route, and Oregon State Parks are pretty amazing anyway. There are lots of beautiful vistas, lots of amenities, and the weather in the summer was great both times. (I wouldn't start too late. Doing this route in a constant rain or drizzle would be miserable. My nephew did the west coast in October/November and had a lot of cold, wet days and nights. Brrrr. Yuck! But in mid-July or August it's usually really nice.

The first time I fell in with some guys who were only going as far as Brookings. They had called ahead and reserved some bike boxes at the local bike seller in Brookings (which I think was a hardware store in 1992; that may have changed.) They boxed up their bikes and sent them home. They got on a Greyhound bus in Brookings that took them back to Portland, where they flew out to their respective homes in Reno and Sacramento. I'm assuming Greyhound still runs there and you could do something similar?

When I did it the second time I rented a car in Crescent City and drove myself home to the central coast of California. I'm sure you could do the same and drive yourself back to wherever you left your car.

Consider buying "Bicycling the Pacific Coast" by Kirkendall/Spring. It's "the Bible" for that route. ACA also has a pacific coast route, and I'm sure their maps would be useful. But you could do just fine with just an Oregon bike map. All you really need to know is where the campgrounds are.

aloKen

Rent a car at your destination and drive back. Sooooooooo much easier than any other option. Probably cheaper too, for two people.
We LOVED the Oregon coast when we did it; can't wait to go back.

staehpj1 

Different strokes... I thought the Oregon coast was very scenic and great riding. Additionally the state campgrounds in Oregon are very nice and inexpensive as well.

To the OP, for getting back... I'm not sure if there is train or bus service, but if all else fails a one way car rental works well and the cost isn't bad if there is more than one person. Check several rental companies because prices and availability of one way rentals varies widely.

positron

err... commas?



Of course he is sanctimonious, hes a Vegan troll.

OP: I would see if it is possible to rent a car at the finish, and drive back to the start. I'm not familiar with the route, but I assume that there are populated cities nearby? maybe shift the route to begin and end somewhere with a rental agency?

As far as the bike is concerned: If you wish to camp you will likely need minimalist gear, combined with large handlebar bags and saddlebags (Carradice camper LF or super-C with approx. volume equivalence to one rear pannier), or some means of attaching at least a small rear rack. It should be possible to cobble something suitable together, even if your frame is not eyeletted at all. There are a number of solutions for fitting carriers to bikes via the quick release skewer- see Tubus and Old Man Mountain. The most elegant system for a road bike might be a Tubus Vega (or similar), with a QR adapter kit. As far as the top rack mounts are concerned, these really only prevent the rack from rotating around the bottom load-bearing mount; in this case, P clamps work perfectly well...

vegenaise

i see no need for proper sentence structure on a dumb board. it's not like i am writing my doctoral dissertation. the op has no excuse as an adult english speaking male for not knowing how to spell route.

TBatty

Thanks all for the feedback, even the spelling correction- it does bug me when I make spelling errors. I expected that a one way car rental may be the best option for the return trip, although JimT's suggestion is worth considering as well. Mostly looking for a way to try out bike touring, and this seemed like a route (happy now?) that would be a good starting point.

screenwasher

Love the Oregon coast - 7 votes
Hate the Oregon coast - 1 vote
Now, that is a real ROUT.

kayakdiver

Love the Oregon coast - 8 votes
Hate the Oregon coast - 1 vote
Now, that is a real ROUT.

Great ride OP... adding my vote

damselfli

I rode the Oregon Coast last summer, traveling by bus from the Portland train station to Astoria. Portland train station was very helpful with information. The bicycle and panniers had to be separated, but all stowed neatly under the bus. The bus delivered me rather late (after dark) and I had to ride a bit to my first campground stop at Ft Stevens SP
https://www.oregonstateparks.org/park_179.php
This is a great park, they even had a nice outdoor large screen slide show. I would recommend riding there, even if you don't plan to camp -- especially if the shipwreck is visible.
I was camping, so my bike was fully loaded and *too* heavy - live and learn. I rode as far south as Neskowin and in a town just south of there, there is a bus over the ridge east to Corvalis, then rode to Eugene and farther south. I took the scenic route, including the detour out to Cape Meares; if you skip these places, you may miss some of the most beautiful scenery along the coast. Steep grades? Yes. Worth it? Yes. Remember to wear bright colors and to have rain gear -- even if it isn't raining, the morning fog is dripping!

The train back to Portland would be my personal choice for round trip. Take note: at some point along this north/south corridor, Amtrak requires bicycles to be "boxed". I'd recommend checking with them to find out where that occurs (because, north of that point, you can just roll your bike on board -- much nicer!)

Car rental (one way) is very expensive (from my experience last summer); it was prohibitive, in fact.

badger_biker 

I'm planning a loop with a start off of Amtrak in Salem then out to the coast down to Jedediah SP and across to Klamath Falls to catch Amtrak back to Portland and home. Klamath Falls is on a route that requires boxing and does have a baggage stop. I wish there was a stop closer to the coast so I could make use of some of my days in the northern coast section instead of heading so far East to KF.

I rode Tillamook to Newport a number of years ago and I agree with damselfli that Cape Meares is worth it as is the detour off 101 from Neskowin to Otis.

AsanaCycles

I also like the Oregon Coast Line.

From PDX you could use www.PortlandSagWagon.com
and Allen will shuttle you to Astoria.

Doug64

Amtrak bike boxes are $15. They are huge. Just take off your pedals, turn your bars and put it in. We put all four of the empty panniers in the box. We have an ultra light duffle to hold gear that goes in the panniers.




That large yellow bag in the foreground weighs about 6 ounces and will hold everything that fits in my panniers.



All we have to carry on the trains are the rack packs, handle bar bags and the duffle bags.

Big Lew

I rode the west coast from Vancouver, British Columbia through Washington to Astoria, following the coast down through Oregon and northern California to San Fransisco. It's a great ride, especially through Oregon, lots of places to stay, eat, etc. and will be great in the early fall. I have ridden from Fairbanks, Alaska south and throughout the Yukon and British Columbia.....the coast ride was my second most enjoyable trip, riding the Alcan (Alaskan Hwy.) was # one. Renting a large car or a mini-van is a good way to get back....I rented a "one-way"car from San Fransisco to Bellingham with no hassles, and it was very reasonable. Hope you decide to go....you'll really enjoy the trip.

Olden Crow

"crappy shoulders, tons of traffic"

Same thing hwy 1 in California.
I only go there off season when nobody else is on vacation and stay off roads on weekends.
Basically I'm chicken.

D.B. Cooper

Your grammar is worse than TBatty's spelling.

Doug64

Saw this today, and thought of this thread.

https://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm...its_parks.html

Olden Crow

"Along the roughly 340-mile Pacific coastline of Oregon,..state parks and recreation sites..at least 64,...there's a state-maintained park or public access site on the average of every five miles...along hwy 101....What's more, most of the campgrounds feature free hot showers"