An Extremely Rad Adventure: Part I

Because I go to a school that is not controlled by the government, I get a sweet, week-long break in the middle of October.  Same idea as spring break, just in the fall.  Since the only beaches within reach were cold, rainy, and distinctly lacking fun things to do, my bro Chris and I decided to head out for a road trip.  On the hit list were Hood River, Leavenworth, and Bellingham.  This rad trip ended up being just like a big ole bite of gnar bar...

With the car loaded we rocked the I-84 out to our first stop, Hood River, Oregon.  It is only about an hour drive out of Portland so we had plenty of ride time for the day.  Instead of stopping in town we crossed the toll bridge to the Washington side and headed out to Bingen and the Syncline trails.  Syncline is a giant plateu that is tilted over at a 30 degree angle.  There are a few mellow xc lines and some pretty hairy downhill rock moves that are precariously close to a 200 ft cliff.

The View of Syncline from across the river.  Note the extra large cliff on the left.

  

Just being the two of us, there was no way we could set up a shuttle.  Instead we strapped our pads to our packs and started the long pedal up.  We stopped climbing the old, switchbacking jeep track about half way up.  This was far enough for us on a day that had proved to be sunny and warm instead of the promised pouring rain, it was time to rip.  We took it easy on the first run, railing down the buff singletrack on the rider's left.  After pedalling back up we decided to rock the rocks next to the cliff.  Before decending we had the good fortune of meeting Landon, the owner of Tonic Fabrications.  We chatted for a bit and then he showed us how it was done going down.

Chris handles a rock roller with ease

Next up we decided to go have a rip on the Coyote Canyon trail.  This bad boy snakes its way along the bottom of the cliff, through some sweet looking trees and copious amounts of nettles.  This time of year the stingers were all gone so we just had a fun rip and took some great shots.

Chris pinning it through the fall colors

Me getting rad around a corner

Pretty cool lighting as the sun worked its way down

After ripping through the fallen leaves we headed back across the toll bridge to find some food and make camp for the night.  We found a prime spot near the head of some trails close to Hood River and made our selves some custom cedar roasted ham and cheese sammiches with fixings we picked up for around $5.00 at Safeway.  We headed to bed early so we could get rad again early the next morning.

To be continued...