Category: PNW
Dawn Patrol
Holcomb Creek Trestle
Found this the other night on the evening ramble. Some stats from the Bridge Hunter: https://bridgehunter.com/or/washington/bh44802/ Says it’s the longest wooden bridge still in use. 1168 feet long and about 90 feet tall. Part of a retired logging rail line that ran from near the coast to Portland. The United Railways. The segment between Banks and Vernonia is now known as the Banks To Vernonia Rail Trail. And the portion from this trestle over to Portland gets interrupted at the Plumper Pumpkin Patch and Tree Farm near Rock Creek Road but picks back up again after Cornelius Pass Road. Here’s a video of eastbound action not too long ago maybe 2010 or so: https://youtu.be/WBLBa3QBZLk?t=70
Carnitas – Giver of Life
Bike ride yesterday. Clear skies, open road, Monday and not many people cluttering the byways in this neck of the woods.
Lunchtime. Mile marker 20. King Torta taco shop, a past favorite and the real deal in North Plains, is far too busy. Hunger bites and gnaws at the guts like a pack of wolverines tangling with a den of pit vipers as I continue on westward down Pacific Street in a taco-less angst ridden melancholy. Spirits decline and dark thoughts enter my mind: will I make it home? should I request an extraction?
Push through town, back out onto the landscape of cultivation growth harvest, rinse repeat. Quiet two lane, getting hotter, puff of breeze, the hunger grows and saps the waning motivation, sweat dripping into eyes, starting to whimper, occasional moan, clif bar in the bag as a last resort when…a mirage! NO! a taco truck passes and pulls into the Campo Casa Blanca farmstead half mile up ahead.
Spurred on by the heady and titillating trail mix of exhaust and grilled pork I follow, picking up the pace a bit and turn into the driveway, ignoring the warning signs regaling potential offenders on the value of private property and the repercussions of trespass, whoring, spitting, smoking, cock fighting, gambling and general licentiousness.
Big clean gravel lot the kind you dream about, shade trees, the farmhouse, orderly rows of farm-worker housing. He’s parked at the edge of the lot under a heritage looking oak and has the sides up and open for business by the time I lean the bike against the bumper.
Says What can I get you boss? I am a supplicant to my saviors with the mobile grill and excitedly blurt wholeheartedly and without hesitation: Two carnitas and a jarritos por favor. You got it he says. The kid admires the bike as we wait and I try some idle chit chat but the well of speech is near dry fogged by the heat and hunger and he’s got work to do so we leave off.
These seasoned pros know their business and in no time I cradle tacos in a paper tray. My hand begins to scorch as I try to balance the tacos, soda, wallet, the mental fatigue and emotional elation confuse my ability to juggle but the pain is short lived and the tray is empty too soon wolfed down with a sprinkling of tomatillo sauce. Licking fingers clean the napkins forgotten in the excitement but that is what sleeves are for as we all know. The tacos are delicious, nearly the best, onion, cilantro, and in this moment they are nirvana, the pinnacle of my affection for the time being.
No one has questioned my daring infiltration of this agrarian commune and I decide to move along before my trespass is questioned and the spell broken by the overseer looking guy in the sombrero over by the big house who I notice is shooting glances my way over his shoulder. Chesty words and elevated hackles are no kind of digestif so I reluctantly roll out of the yard crunching gravel under wheels, past the sentry shack that I failed to check in at, back onto the public blacktop for a clean getaway.
The Groove has delivered.
Berry Nice
Evening visit to West Union Gardens with expert Buehler pickers. Targeted the Boysens and Marions. Good haul, couple pies.
Cannon Beach Pedal
Pedaling the beach again.
The Road to Roy
Tualatin Valley Quilt Barn Cemetery Data Center Bicycle Tour
A Tualatin Valley bicycle tour including Roy, quilt blocks, nuts, grass, data, berries, and a cemetery.
Headed north out of Hillsboro on Glencoe Road and the first stop was the Coussens barn for a stretch and gander.
I’d seen this barn decor on a previous lap and learned it is part of the Tualatin Valley Quilt Barn Trail.
Travel Oregon has a Video.
They’re called quilt blocks. Spotted three more before the end of the loop.
Westside Quilter’s Guild map: The Quilt Barn Trail of Oregon’s Washington County
Glencoe Road.
45.56267912769301, -123.00148121724139
Take the lane.
Quiet rural two lane. Low traffic. No shoulder to speak of, packed gravel occasionally.
Wren Road.
45.562512558297826, -123.00923192337619
U-Pick Blueberries.
Wren Road.
Road to Ruin is a half mile further on.
NW Cornelius Schefflin Road. Busier and faster than Wren Road but with a good sized shoulder.
45.56509857255572, -123.05225540615638
Looked like a good place for a camp-out or a rave, maybe a fyre festival. Or how about a Burning Something? Whatever happens should include plenty of taco trucks.
Roy Road. Quieter than Wren Road. Very low traffic. Good to very good surface.
45.57524026190394, -123.05786428290953
Put the
squeeze
on a cow
Eat
dairy
products
“
Roy Road.
Roy has a handful of housing and a catholic monopoly.
I continued east along NW Harrington Road sins intact smelling the roses when necessary.
45.59530030953294, -123.0799819355438
Made it through Roy unconverted. Blueberries. Harrington Road.
No big sign or announcement, if you blinked you missed it. But on a bike you find stuff like the Historic Harrison Cemetery.
Most of the original markers had toppled, the pieces placed on the ground next to the former bases. Others had been I assumed lost to time and replaced with aluminum plaques. Many of the inhabitants were young, children, 20’s, but there were a few older people as well, 70’s. Two were “lost in a flood 8 DEC 1857”.
Oregon State Parks Historic Cemeteries Program
NW Dersham Road.
45.602324102357564, -123.04031438297123
Adjacent to the cemetery. No action today.
Rode over for a closer look and there was this guy in a late model SUV with the windows all rolled up and I could very clearly hear Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds belting it out so I just turned around and left him to it.
45.60348862639077, -123.04252602789195
Hillsboro.
NE Starr Boulevard.
45.55916955175943, -122.93637810267816
LL Stubs Stewart State Park – Shoofly Trail
Trail ride at Stub Stewart State Park on the Shoofly Trail
Fatbike Gearhart Beach Day
Cannon Beach Low Tide Candy Run
Another minus tide. This time it’s a Saturday on one of the hottest days of the year. Beach communities are begging people to stay away so of course we and the rest of Portland Metro pack our debris and truck over the coast ranges to pay them a visit. Got a head start on the crowds and arrived CB at 8:12 AM. Pedaled up to the tide-pools ogled the anemone starfish barnacles crabs mussels flotsam jetsam etc. Lots more people today but with 3x the beach area available everyone easily distanced. Enjoyed a picnic in the park afterwards then a stroll into town over the bridge to Bruce’s for a taffy reload. Home by noon. Good time.