Exploring Eastern Washington

[OfficerImpersonator]

I'm heading out Friday morning with a couple of friends for a three-day, 1000 mile ride from Seattle to Eastern Washington State.

On Friday morning, we'll depart Seattle and head east on I-90 to Ellensburg. In Ellensburg, we'll switch over to the Vantage Hwy for the ride down to the Columbia River at Vantage, where we'll cross the river and head south-east towards Othello. We'll take the lesser highways through the small towns of the Palouse to Friday night's camp site at Hell's Gate State Park in Lewiston, Idaho.

Saturday morning, we'll ride north to Pullman, Washington, and then take the back roads along the Idaho-Washington border to Spokane. From Spokane, we'll continue north to Sullivan Lake and Saturday night's camp site at the Sullivan Lake National Forest Service Campground. , knocking off a few "Destination Highways" along the way.

Sunday morning we'll follow Washington State highway 20 from Ione/Tiger WA all the way back to the east side of the Cascades, where we'll then decide how to cross back to the Seattle area - either via the North Cascades Hwy, the Stevens Pass Hwy, or Blewett Pass and then I-90 over Snoqualmie Pass.

Here's our route: http://goo.gl/maps/7q7u

This should be an excellent ride to areas I've never explored before. I'm looking forward to adding a bunch of dead insects to the front of the bike this weekend!

 

[W7lej1]

SWEET! Great ride plan. Hope the weather co-operates! Drop me a PM if I can provide any help as I live/ride over here. (Before Thu - I'm going OOT to pick up and ride back a new ride.)

Marty in Spokane Valley

 

[OfficerImpersonator]

As of now, the weather forecast for Eastern Washington is mostly sunny with highs in the mid-70s.

A chance of thunderstorms in the NE mountains on Sunday has my attention, but hopefully we'll be well on our way back to Seattle by the time the sun heats up the ground.

 

[lvermiere]

looks good. my prefernce from Okanogan would be through Winthrop staying on 20.

hwy 97 South of omak is pretty dreary.......

 

[OfficerImpersonator]

looks good. my prefernce from Okanogan would be through Winthrop staying on 20.

hwy 97 South of omak is pretty dreary.......

We did SR9 -> SR 20 -> SR 153 -> US 97 -> US 2 two weeks ago, so missing the North Cascades Hwy wouldn't be a horrible result. Last time we by-passed Chelan by taking 97E, so we'll take 97W for a slight change of pace this time.

 

[dsalesky]

good route.

I'll be motoring north towards Priest Lake on Saturday leaving Portland. If you see a black 99 RT wave as you go by.

 

[Bdiver]

Probably to late for you to see this but be careful in the upper NE of the state for all sorts of furry critters. Have a safe trip.

 

[Raptor02]

Have a great trip. Looking forward to the images from your journey.
JC

 

[OfficerImpersonator]

The trip was MOSTLY great.

We left Seattle and the suburbs early Friday morning.

There was light rain and mist off and on for the first 60 miles to Snoqualmie Pass. The moment we cleared the summit, the overcast evaporated and the sun was out with an entire horizon's worth of puffy cumulus clouds.

After gassing up in Issaquah, we rode I-90 to Ellensburg, where we exited and took the Vantage Hwy from Ellensburg down to Vantage. This road goes right through the Puget Sound Energy wind farm, and you spend about 40 minutes winding down through a canyon with 155' tall wind turbines all around you.

We crossed the Columbia River and then immediately headed south towards the Tri-Cities. Soon we turned left and headed east towards Othello. Along this stretch I noticed that my turn signals weren't working. Further explorations showed that my headlamp, fog lamps, auxiliary driving lights, and marker/running lights were all out.

As there were three of us, I felt there was safety in numbers, so we pressed on. Refueled in Othello. From here we continued east-southeast towards the southeast corner of Washington State. State highways 260 and 261 and US 12 between the towns of Connell and Clarkston, WA are all fabulous riding.

We made it to our night's camp at Hell's Gate State Park in Lewiston, WA. (Yes, Lewiston, ID and Clarkston, WA are across the Snake River from each other, and are named after the famed explorers who came through these parts. The camp host shared that the Idaho MOA chapter used to have an annual camp-out at the park, and that the motorcyclists who came used to complain about the loud campers. It was the first time in his experience that the motorcyclists whined about the other campers, and not the other way around. The campsite was lovely.

After setting up camp, we rode into town for food and beverages. Throw a bag of ice and a couple of hoagies and a six pack in the side case and voila - instant cooler! We rode back to camp and enjoyed dinner and beer and poking around my bike - without success - to see what we could discover.

We woke up the next morning to another glorious day. Yelp suggested a restaurant with good breakfasts in Lewiston, so we packed up and headed in for food. Arriving at the restaurant, we learned it was a coffee shop, with coffee drinks and pastries and granola, but no "real breakfasts". Overhearing our conversation, a local sitting outside referred us to Hazel's, across the river in Clarkston. So we saddled up and rode the 5 minutes to what turned out to be just what we were looking for.

While pulling into the parking lot at Hazel's, I notice a Honda m/c dealer across the street. At the bottom of the business's sign is the roundel and the words "BMW MOTORCYCLES". I figure this is going to be one of those times where I get to post a glowing review of a great dealership that went out of it's way to help a wounded bike far from home. No such luck.

After a massive and amazing breakfast, I rode across the street to the motorcycle dealer. The first thing I notice is that the sales guys are all too busy selling giant ATVs painted in camouflage to local residents. I'm looking at a $26,000 GTL in the showroom, and everyone wants to help Billy Bob get his new huntin' and fishin' machine. I wander back to the parts counter and explain my tale of woe to the first friendly guy I meet there. He says I should go across the alley and talk to the service department.

Upon arrival at the service department, I tell the guy who comes to the counter that the lights on my RT aren't working. Without feigning interest in my situation, the next words out of his mouth are "I won't be able to look at anything until after I take my lunch, and if we have to order parts it will take weeks". This message was delivered with the tone of "I don't like dealing with out-of-towners on their complicated bikes". I told him I'd have this addressed when I got home and promptly excused myself from the dealership. The thought to do an on-the-spot trade-in for the 2011 RT or the GTL they had in the showroom did cross my mind, but the RTP is still a keeper and Mac's Motorcycles in Clarkston, WA wasn't going to see a dime of my money.

After fueling up and leaving Clarkston/Lewiston, we briefly headed east on US 12 before heading north across the Clearwater River on US 95 and then US 195 into the college town of Pullman, WA. The ride up US 95 out of Clarkston/Lewiston is spectacular, as the highway gains 2000' to climb up above the Snake/Clearwater river valleys to the plateau of the Palouse. The views south into Washington, Oregon and Idaho are spectacular.

From Pullman, we took the "Palouse Highway" (SR 27) through the rolling farmland and the quaint towns of Palouse, Garfield, Oakesdale, Tekoa, Latah, Fairfield and Rockford. Spectacular riding on deserted highways through empty farmland painted a vivid green by an abnormally cool and wet spring.

It was while riding through the Palouse that I decided I did not want to spend the next day riding 10 hours without lights. If we turned west at Spokane, we could be home 4 1/2 hours later. During a short break in the town of Tekoa, I shared my thoughts with my riding buddies. They agreed that sounded like a good idea. One of our party was heading back to Seattle on Saturday anyways to moto-ref a bicycle race on Sunday, so the decision was made easier for us. Thus, after a brief ride north from Rockford to Spokane, we turned west on I-90 and blazed home to Seattle. I did notice that the Spokane area has a BMW dealer once again, as we passed by "Westside Power Sports" (across the freeway from the airport), and again spotted the roundel on a shop's sign.

The ride west through eastern and central Washington was boring and uneventful. We killed a lot of bugs with our bikes and our helmets. The wind was pretty strong and gusty, which took a lot of mental and physical effort.

The moment we reached Snoqualmie Pass, the wind abated and we enjoyed a beautiful ride back down though the luxuriant green of Western Washington.

Now the bike is torn apart in the garage as I try to chase down the fault. You can read all about that in the "Oilhead" forum.

Now I have an excuse to get back out there and explore the part of the state we cut out of our trip - northeast Washington State.

The route:

 

[dsalesky]

I-90

I saw you guys zip past me on I-90 Saturday. Just East of Vantage, were did the Ol K75RTP come from? Hope you have a good weekend, pictures looked great.

 

[OfficerImpersonator]

I saw you guys zip past me on I-90 Saturday. Just East of Vantage, were did the Ol K75RTP come from? Hope you have a good weekend, pictures looked great.

If you get up close and look at the right angle in the right light, you can still read where the "Fayetteville, North Carolina Police Department" stickers used to be.

I don't know the full history (it's a friend's bike), but he bought it used off of Craigslist a couple of months ago from a seller in the Olympia area.