Oregon including the McKenzie River Trail and excluding all sales tax

Click on the pics for larger, higher resolution versions (180k to 300k) stored at mac.com

...well, I made it to Crescent City but the shops were too busy so one of the shops referred me up to the Tranny Man in Brookings, OR. Great guys but they were the bearer of major bad news when we put my Jeep up on the lift on a late Friday afternoon. My dealer in SoCal had cracked the transmission case in 2 places and stripped out 2 of the bolt holes. They had repaired the 2 cracks with JB Weld which promptly gave out after approx 700 miles. Since the guys that did all the ordering and stuff were already out of town for a car show I had to wait until Monday for them to get started on the repair. So basically I was stuck in Brookings for 5 nights with no singletrack nearby which meant I was going to have to stick to the road for those 6 days. But at least I had this excellent beach to hangout on after the rides.

Happily back on the road again after a 5 day delay and the skipping of the Lower Rogue River Trail I finally met up with fellow a.m-b'er Blaine. He had driven down from Portland and we met on the outskirts of Eugene. We had planned on shuttling the McKenzie River Trail since neither of us had time to do the entire 25 mile length as an out-and-back. It's a good thing that we had planned on the shuttle as after having driven an hour out to the lower trailhead Blaine discovered he had forgotten his shoes. The choices were for me to ride solo, or to head into Eugene with Blaine so he could buy some shoes. Having ridden solo for the previous week and a half and since it was still early enough in the day it was easy for me to decide to head into town with him. So after my 5 day delay and Blaine's 4 hour delay we made it to Coldwater Cove Campground where were able to access the McKenzie River Trail at a point where we would get in 22 miles of it. This is Blaine powering through one of the typical lava sections in the first third of the trail.

Shortly into our version of this ride we came upon Sahalie Falls. Since it was in the 80s and I had been riding in 60 degree weather for the previous week these trips near the river were very welcome by me for the cooling mist.

Blaine cruising through one of the ubiquitous lava canyons about a third of the way down.

The pool at the bottom of the dry Tamolitch Falls was the bluest, yet clearest water I have ever seen.

This was pretty typical of the rest of the trail. Twisty, flat singletrack for miles and miles. After the ride we quickly pounded a beer or two and drove back up to Blaine's truck at the Coldwater Cove Campground. It was getting late so we parted ways, I had to set up camp and cook, and Blaine had a long drive ahead of him back to Portland.

The next morning after a quiet night at Clear Lake I blasted over to Sisters and Bend, and then headed south to catch up with friends in Grants Pass. Presumably the highlight of that day was going to be a drive and hike at Crater Lake but due to smoke from nearby forest fires this is I all could see. Pretty much nothing.