Pacific Northwest Backroad Adventures

Over on the forum at OBCDR Trip Report, Decidion posted up a web page with a trip report of a recent 4-day trip through the Oregon Backcountry.

Decidion describes the trip as follows:

“The Oregon Backcountry Discovery Route is a series of gravel and offroad/4×4 trails that leads from the California border all the way up to the Washington border along the eastern edge of the Cascade mountains. It is primarily US Forest Service roads, some of which are maintain, but a lot of them have not seen any cleanup since the last person who ran the route.”

Read the trip report at Oregon Backcountry Discovery Route Trip.

Summer in Western Washington usually doesn’t start officially (at least weather wise) until July 5 of each year. Today (06.24.07) was no exception. The forecast for the day was for rain and a snow level of 5000 feet.

Since I worked the night before and my wife’s nephew was coming over for dinner, I had to keep the day’s adventure somewhat local from my home. Flipping through the book Washington Byways, I found Tour 49 - High Rock Lookout Loop and it fit perfectly into the day’s time restraints. I loaded up the dog in the Land Cruiser and headed towards the Cascades in hopes of finding some sun above the low hanging clouds.

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Last Sunday (June 24, 2007), I ventured into the High Rock area near Mt. Rainier. The weather was overcast and rain most of the day meaning in no great views of Mt. Rainier. These are the photos I shot on this adventure. Most are taken from the inside of my Toyota Land Cruiser.

High Rock Loop Photos

The complete story of this adventure will be coming soon.

After the floods in the Fall of 2006, many of your favorite Washington state backcountry roads and hiking trails have some amount of damage. Before you head out you may want to find out if you can even reach your intended destination.

Even though many of you do not agree with their agenda, the Washington Trails Association has kindly provided a database and map of damages hiking trails and backcountry roads throughout Washington state that will be kept up to date as conditions change (and as the snow in the high country melts).

If you’re new to GPS (like me) and want to use your GPS unit for vehicle dependant expeditions and exploring, paddlenbike over at 4wdtrips.net has a great post titled “Thinking about GPS? Some things to consider”. He reviews what configurations are available and what actually works for backcountry off-road travel. Enjoy.

After getting my Jeep back together, I wanted to get a multi-day camping/road trip in. I wanted to see how my newly built cargo box was going to work and experiment with stowing camping gear for a 3-day mini-expedition plus a dog.

My goals for this trip weren’t to go wheeling, especially since I was traveling solo. I wanted to hit the back roads and travel as much gravel and/or primitive roads as possible, carrying all my supplies, stopping only for fuel as needed (since I don’t have a gas can carrier yet).

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This is a collection of photos taken between August 6-8, 2006 while taking a backroads tour of the Olympic Peninsula in my Jeep. The gallery features many of the scenic views from the overland routes driven including some from the Olympic National Park.

You can view the gallery at Olympic Peninsula Backroads Tour

Enjoy the pics.