In what was perhaps the best idea ever, on Friday last week, a totally gorgeous day, I opted to bike rather than drive the work truck to a trail. Usually I can’t really do this, since the places I might go for work are pretty far-flung, all over Southwest Washington — and though it’s definitely possible and would probably frequently be quite fun to bike to many of them, it might take, one-way, say, 8 hours. heh.
But Friday’s trail was close, just across the Columbia River near the I-205 bridge, and it was beautiful out, so I biked there. Which was the best idea ever. And then I took the long way home, which was also the best idea ever:)
.
(part of the long way home on a beautiful day:)
.
There is a nice way, on the Washington side, to get between the I-205 bridge over the Columbia River and the I-5 bridge, and with my ride home last week I’ve finally done it efficiently in both directions. And it is great either way. (The worst part of it, honestly, is having to cross the 205 bridge, which just flat-out sucks no matter what. Ha, not wanting to cross back over the 205 bridge was a strongly motivating factor to take the long way home, honestly;)
Anyway. The Vancouver “waterfront path” is not like the Oregon side, where there’s one main frequently-but-not-always lovely path that parallels (or sometimes uses) Marine Drive. On the Vancouver side, there’s a way you can follow that uses several different paths through different parks and along riverfront condos and restaurants, some nice streets through a fancy neighborhood (with a killer hill if you’re going west to east), something called “Evergreen Highway” which is actually pretty nice here, and one section where you just ride on the sidewalk through industrial-land (which is actually not as bad as it sounds).
.
(The Columbia River Renaissance Trail is a lovely 5-mile section that’s mostly on trails but also includes the weird sidewalk through industrial-land if you’re going east (there’s an on-street bike lane if you’re going west)
.
This hodgepodge of routefinding is maybe is why I haven’t done it that much, cuz it took me a while to find, and it’s not always intuitive. Also, it’s not a fast route: several of the paths seem like they probably get quite busy when it’s nicer out,* so it’s more of a slow riverfront toodle navigating through lots of other folks than a direct and quick commute. But it’s really quite pleasant. I’d probably do it more coming home from work (which is on the I-5 side of Vancouver) if it didn’t end with me having to bike back to Oregon on the 205 bridge.
.
(this is part of the non-intuitiveness. Going west, you go down a big hill on Chelsea Ave, and it looks like you’ve gone astray because the road just ends at this gated fancy home (STAY OUT, YE STRANGERS!! ha). But if you go through the black fence where my bike is leaning and then follow it for a bit parallel to this person’s yard, you get to a staircase that takes you approximately 18 steps down into Wintler Park where you can get on the bike path)
So, I don’t know, it probably won’t ever be a way that I take home regularly or anything, but it is a nice option when I want to switch it up. Which as we know I do frequently like to do;) It’d also be a fun random adventure ride: cross to Vancouver on the I-5 bridge, hop on the Columbia Renaissance Trail, hang out at a few of the beaches you go past (one has an osprey nest just offshore!:) and then go home via the I-5 bridge again when you’re ready. That would save you the 205 commute as well as the Evergreen Highway part of the Vancouver side.
As always, it’s fun to go someplace new!:) Yay for the long ride home:)
.
(I feel like I should tell any work peeps reading this not to worry, I still got an appropriate amount of working in, despite the long way;)
.
* In fact, if you look at this document linked on the Columbia Renaissance Trail page, it has a bunch of info I imagine from a survey of path users, and many of the comments have to do with being annoyed with bikers going too fast when there are lots of pedestrians about. So, don’t be that jerk slaloming at 20mph through old people and toddlers out enjoying the day.