Category Archives: United States

Highway 101: Coastal Redwood Forests, They're Big

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Route Map View Cycling Cal­i­for­nia, USA in a larger map Key By bike By plane By ferry By train By bus   Within 20 min­utes of leav­ing Ed and Bobbie’s I’d reached the Cal­i­for­nia State Line. If I’d have passed this way at dif­fer­ent times dur­ing the 18th cen­tury, I would have been in Spain (until the Mexican […]

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The Oregon Coast: All It's Cracked Up To Be... And More

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Before I’d decided in which direc­tion this trip would be going I’d heard all about cycling the Cal­i­for­nia coast but noth­ing about the Ore­gon coast. Sev­eral peo­ple on my route south picked it out as a high­light of cycling in the United States. They were to be proved right. I reached the coast at Lin­coln City […]

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Highways 99 & 18: All Roads Lead To The Coast

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A day-and-a-half along these two gen­er­ally for­get­table high­ways brought me to the Ore­gon coast – my first view of an ocean since dip­ping my toes in the Arc­tic Ocean almost three months before. Although the high­ways from Port­land to the coast were largely unevent­ful – with a brief cycle past a num­ber of vine­yards and the beautiful but […]

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Portland: Where The Bike Is King!

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I saw more and more cyclists as I got closer to Port­land. Helped by big wide shoul­ders on the roads, clearly marked signs & the biggest signs I’d ever seen for a rec­om­mended bike route, it was clear to see what Port­land had gained its rep­u­ta­tion as America’s most-bike friendly city. This sign even marked the way to the […]

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Highway 30: How Far Is It Really To Portland?

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Route Map View Cycling Ore­gon, USA in a larger map Key By bike By plane By ferry By train By bus   The Ore­gon bud­get was not only strug­gling to go beyond a piece of wood and a tin of white paint for its ‘wel­come to the state’ sign, but also to come up with […]

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Backroads To The Oregon State Line

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I was able to fol­low the Hood Canal for another cou­ple of hours, pass­ing through the small com­mu­ni­ties of Lil­li­waup and Hood­sport, before I headed away from the water and onto the back­roads of this part of south­ern Wash­ing­ton State towards the State of Ore­gon. Along this route I came across the only signs of […]

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Highway 101: Port Townsend Down The Hood Canal To Eldon

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I awoke in the dorm room which I shared with two oth­ers to the unex­pected beauty the north-west tip of the Olympic Penin­sula. I took a short walk around the park, whose his­tory is wholly related to war­fare. It started out as an early-warning out­post to pro­tect the first set­tlers in the 1850s from north­ern Indians […]

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Highway 20: The Sun Has Got His Hat On - Whidbey Island

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If yesterday’s down­pour had sig­nalled the end of sum­mer, today’s weather gave an indi­ca­tion of the Indian sum­mer to come. I headed off into blue skies and per­fect cycling tem­per­a­tures of about 20 degrees Centi­grade towards Whid­bey Island. Every­thing had dried overnight except my shoes and it didn’t take long for the sun to dry […]

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Highway 9: Rain, Rain, Go Away - Canadian Border To Sedro Woolley

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Route Map View Cycling Wash­ing­ton State, USA in a larger map Key By bike By plane By ferry By train By bus   Cyclists who cross the bor­der at Sumas are con­sid­ered to be pedes­tri­ans so I wheeled my bike into the cus­toms area. The offi­cer who dealt with me was par­tic­u­larly unfriendly but very […]

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