I finally had time and cooperative weather to ride this classic PNW loop through the mountains. The Seattle Randonneurs have a 200K brevet route but since I was riding on my own I decided to shorted it by ~30 miles and avoid some of the less scenic city riding.

Fantasic tour under blue skies, under falling leaves, and quiet roads among farmland. I started the ride from BI on the normal loop to Port Gamble with a small detour for a road closure.

I started this ride by entering through the Park entrance at Longmire and parking in the day use lot behind the lodge.

I’d been planning this ride for months ever since reading about the climb to Babyshoe Pass in BQ. The climb from Highway 12 to the summit at the intersection with FS 2150 has an average grade of 6% and a max grade of 20% with soft, loose gravel and rough washboard making it tough to keep traction and rhythm.

The tour ridden clockwise ascends gravel and descends a near-perfect paved road.

This year’s edition of Ride the Hurricane had two great changes from last year:

✅ Ride from BI to Deception Pass and back in one day.

The primary goal of the ride had been to see | ride what had become known as the scary bridge – the High Steel Bridge, the highest railway arch bridge ever built in the United States.

An abandoned forest service road, a beautiful river, great views, and a mac & cheese lunch. Pretty perfect ride with Kid.

It’s not an adventure until something goes wrong.