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This is a journal of my motorcycle journeys great and small, ideas and dreams for roads not yet ridden, and reviews of some of the most famous motorcycle roads in the West.

Sunday, August 5, 2012

Diamond Lake 2012


  • Day 2:  Clackamas River Canyon OR224 to FR42  Starting ODO 21520 mi. Route: 70 miles
  • Day 4:  Pavement on the lake loop road is astonishingly good, just not crooked enough.  The road design defies the 35MPH speed limit.  So did I... The north end has a few sweet combinations that work nicely at freeway speeds.
  • Day 7:   Toketee Tour --    Got trapped in OR138 construction traffic, trying to ride a bungled route. Finally went back to Watson Falls and realized FR37 was what I was looking for.  Several Fun miles at the top. One long straight stretch but definitely worth the trip.  Scouted Old Toketee road but ran out of gas and time.  Will try again tomorrow.~79 mi.
  • Day 9:  Ilahee+Copeland/Canton/Panther Creek Tour
    • Ran up the Ilahee while trying to scout the Old Toketee road. Definitely an interesting old road but the pavement is simply too far gone for sport touring.  Adventure bikers can feast on this but I turned around after about 7 miles.  
    • 22 miles up and down on Copeland Creek.  Nice curves and decent pavement. Brush ruined excellent views of Copeland Creek, but the occasional two lanes, road engineering, and generally good pavement is worth many repeats.
    • Fueled up in Glide, then ran back up to Steamboat to ride Canton Creak road to the summit intersection of Canton, Rock, and Sharps Creek roads.  Long stretch of awkward straights finally give way to several miles of challenging technical twisties on a steep ascent to the summit.  Badly overgrown brush on the sides of the road made for very limited sight lines and took a lot of the juice out of the ride.  Worth doing, done it, won't go back. 
    • Panther Creek (NF-4714)  was dessert for the day and it was twenty miles (round trip) of unadulterated, five-star, technical riding on a classic Oregon one-lane logging road.  Unrelenting curves start less than a half-mile off OR138 and there are very few straight sections, none of them of significant length.  Sight lines were unusually good with many opportunities to see to the end of six turn combinations, possibly due to fires or controlled burns in the not-so-distant past.  Not that there weren't tire-scorching switch backs and blind rock overhangs, but sight lines are generally better than what you encounter in the Coast range or on the west slope of the Cascades. Pavement was generally good all the way to the interection with the gravel-only NF-2703.  Yes, there was gravel, wood debris, and an occasional sunken grade - one in the best part of the line through a sharp bend that will launch the incautious rider into the trees - but you won't find many go cart tracks like this in the Pacific Northwest.  The net effect of this end-of-the-day ride was to make me want more.  I will be back to do Panther Creek and Copeland Creek as often as I can get back home to the North Umpqua. Rear tire is toast after only 4K; time for new skins. ~220 mi., ODO 22060