It’s a cold and rainy Christmas evening and I’m full of a British-style roast-and-potatoes dinner, so I’m digging through photos of good past bike trips [I’ll post this some time in January when I get around to it].

Here’s a ride from mid-2009 (back when the idea of a 40-mile bike ride with hills was daunting): along the Columbia River Gorge to Multnomah Falls during a visit to Oregon. Portland is of course a city conducive to cycling in many ways (with detailed city bike maps and many places to rent bikes– I’ve rented from both Waterfront and Kerr).

The morning started with a jaunt through leafy SE Portland:

The City Of Roses:

Breakfast at The Waffle Window

In particular, the bacon/brie/basil waffle– remarkable!

Coffee:

And then it was time to start the ride by taking the MAX to Gresham, on the edge of Portland. Another option would have been to start biking in downtown Portland, perhaps by taking the Springwater Corridor (map 1, PDF map 2)

I talked to some interesting people on the train near Gresham, including a young couple with a small kid in a stroller. The guy had fresh scabs all over his arms– “pavement kisses”, as he called them, from a fight. His girlfriend started telling a story about being on the train when the cops boarded, and watching another passenger try to hide a bag of white powder… err… “internally”. They warned me about one neighborhood we were passing through, saying “don’t bike there– they’ll even jack you for a Huffy”.

But back on topic– I got off in Gresham and off I rode, on this roughly 40-mile there-and-back route:

Halfway along the route, I stopped at Vista House / Crown Point, with a panoramic view of the Columbia River Gorge and Washington State across it. These pictures don’t do it justice.

Then down a twisting set of roads to the Historic Columbia River Highway. It was fairly low on traffic because there’s a more direct highway route to the falls.

There are 3 or 4 waterfalls along this route, but Multnomah Falls was the tallest (and most packed with visitors):

After a long tiring climb back up to Crown Point, I headed back to Portland for indian food (Hoda) and wine (kindly provided by the friend of a friend I was staying with, who had a basement full of cases).

.

All in all, a great day, and a ride I would recommend, though the hybrid rental bike I was on was a bit small and uncomfortable (Waterfront also rents road bikes, but when I showed up they told me I should have called ahead and would have to wait a while if I wanted one). Jeans weren’t the ideal biking-in-the-sun attire, either, to make another excuse.

If I’m there again some day with two days to spare, I have my eye on biking farther along the Gorge, with an overnight in Hood River or The Dalles before heading back (somewhere between 40-80 miles each way depending on the details). Some reading turned up a range of web sites and maps of potential trip legs (#1, #2, #3, #4).