On a beautiful sunny late summer day we did a gravel ride out and back on Kilchis Forest Road on the way to Tillamook. This gravel road goes forever and opens up the possibility of some big loops but for now we just did an out and back.
The Kilchis River was named for the 19th century Tillamook leader Chief Kilchis, one of the last free chiefs of the Tillamook tribe. The river is about 14 miles long, eventually feeding into nearby Tillamook Bay. This was a straightforward ride…ride one way as far as you want and then turn around. Derek’s hip was bothering him from a crash on our previous ride so we kept the ride to a couple hours. You could go much further!
Along the way we saw a ridiculous amount of green. Mossy rocks, ferns, Spruce, Douglas Fir, Maple, Cedar and many more. The surface is varied with hard pack, gravel, some potholes and washboard and everything in between. We rode gravel bikes and that seemed fine but you could also take a mountain bike. This is a logging area so watch out for trucks…we saw one oncoming and just pulled over to let it come through. You can primitive camp in this area and we turned down a few spurs to check out the river.
We’ll be back to explore more!
