C&O- Let’s Go For A Ride

I live in Eugene, OR, a very bike friendly town. In our small city, which if squared up would measure 6 miles by 7 miles, we have 64 miles of shared use paths, 193 miles of on-street bike lanes, and 71 miles of signed bikeways. There are also 7 bike/pedestrian bridges over the Willamette River. So I have a lot of options for training routes.

One of my favorites is along the Willamette River. (Side note: It is pronounced “will-AM- it”, from the Chinook Wawa language, although the end spelling was later Frenchified by early European fur trappers.) From my house it is about two miles through neighborhoods to get to the river bikeways. From there it is basically flat and all but about 2 miles of this 16 mile river circuit is on bikeways ( i.e. no cars.) [See map above.]

So, today I thought I would take you along on my training ride via photos. The day starts with a brief, but colorful sunrise. Being in the upper 30’s, we don’t start out until it has warmed up into the low 50’s around 10AM. So have another cup of coffee. Then we ride the two miles through the neighborhoods of this college town (home of U of O) to the river.

Once at the river we join the bikeway south, upriver, toward our sister town of Springfield, crossing the Willamette on the circa 1929 Main St. Bridge. From the Springfield side we immediately join the bikeway headed northbound, downriver.

The paved path here moves in and out of deep forest, dancing with the river. Periodic views of the water pop in and out of view in this linear park, as running paths, bikeways, and hiking trails make their separate ways through these woods.

Five and a half miles in, we come out of the forest and cross under the Interstate 5 bridges. This immense pair of concrete deck arch bridges is pretty impressive and is the bikeway portal to a vast new landscape.

After traversing the forest in a town so covered by trees, this giant meadow on the other side of the bridge is always a bit of a surprise. It goes on for about a mile and a half before we are plunged back into the woods, again.

The next few miles of the path works its way through forest that includes some old growth trees. These giants never fail to impress me. I always wonder how they escaped the ax?

Next up is the Sun. Yep, old Sol is right there along the trail. You are probably surprised to learn that Eugene is home to the Sun, but I offer photographic proof right here. This sun is a 1 to 1,000,000,000 scale model of the real Sun. Not only is there a scale model of the sun, but also of all the planets and the distances between them are to scale, too. For instance Uranus is 1.8 miles away along the bike path or 1.8 billion miles away from the sun in space. Cool! Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars are close by the Sun as you might expect.

However, we will get back to the solar system in a minute, since most of the outer planets are on the other side of the river. But we will continue our journey north along the east side for now. Which brings us to the Delta Ponds. A series of estuaries and ponds near the river with boardwalk bike paths. Essentially, we get to fly over this waterfowl breeding ground on our bikes. Certain times of year the noise from all the geese and ducks is so loud that you can’t hear yourself think!

Beyond the Ponds the bikeway continues to hug the river as it rolls through woods with small scattered open areas. Right now, with snow melt in the mountains and the rains of the last month, the river is going full bore and is up several feet. But even at its lowest, it still fills this channel well.

Now, 11 miles in, we come to the Owosso Bridge. The last bike friendly crossing of the Willamette on the bikeway. Once on the other side, we make a short diversion up to Pluto to add a mile to our route and then turn around and pedal south, upstream, on the west side of the river and head toward our starting point still 7 miles away.

As you may have guessed from our quick field trip to the proto-planet Pluto, we are now back on the side of the river with the Solar System model headed towards the Sun. We will wave at Neptune, about 1.8 miles from Pluto and ride another mile passing Uranus on our way to Saturn. From Uranus to Saturn is another 0.85 miles. And from Saturn to the Sun is another 0.9 miles. The Solar System is a big place. The other planets, in comparison, are all bunched up near the Sun. Mars, the farthest, is just 740 feet from the model Sun.

We have almost completed our circumnavigation of this river bikeway loop. Still, there are about 3.5 miles to go before we get back home. But we finally pedal up to the house, just as we hit the 20 mile mark. It has been a beautiful day. Thanks for riding with me.

Until next week, Happy Trails…