The John Wayne Pioneer rail-trail that rolls through the Iron Horse State Park has to be one of my favorite bicycling destinations. It’s close enough for overnight bicycle camping, but I also get a feeling that I can get-away-from-it-all up here.
I’m including it in a book that I’ve been asked to write about the …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.bikingbis.com/2013/01/14/scenes-of-the-john-wayne-pioneer-rail-trail-then-and-now/
When my wife texted me last Friday that I should take advantage of the sunny fall weather with a Labor Day weekend bike trip, she didn’t have to repeat the offer.
I got to spend a spectacular weekend up on the John Wayne Pioneer Trail, a rail-trail that starts at Cedar Falls east of Seattle and rolls all the way to the Idaho border.
Of course, I didn’t go the full length. With a late start on my touring bicycle on Saturday, I was lucky to make it to that first campground at Alice Creek. It’s a 50-mile ride from home. …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.bikingbis.com/2012/09/07/3-day-weekend-on-john-wayne-pioneer-trail/
As the John Wayne Pioneer Trail leaves the high Cascades and heads southeast from Cle Elum, it enters the Upper Yakima River Canyon.
It was an unexpected scenic treasure on my explorations by bicycle between trail heads in the Iron Horse State Park this fall.
I expected a dusty, exposed route across flat prairie on this segment between Cle Elum and Thorp. Instead, the rail-trail follows the meandering Yakima River as it cuts through ancient volcanic rock on its way to the Columbia River.
My 41-mile bicycling loop started at South Cle Elum …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.bikingbis.com/2011/10/13/cle-elum-to-thorp-bicycling-the-upper-yakima-river-canyon-on-john-wayne-pioneer-trail/
Although the John Wayne Pioneer Trail is a rail-trail well-suited for bicycling, the trail head at South Cle Elum is certainly a draw for railroad enthusiasts.
The large rail yard built by the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad in the early 1900s is preserved there, and a few buildings remain intact. Pedaling into town on the rail-trail gave me a slow-motion idea of the scene witnessed by locomotive engineers.
Lately I've been bicycling different sections of the John Wayne Pioneer Trail east of the Snoqualmie Tunnel. While I don't have the opportunity for a nice through-trip …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.bikingbis.com/2011/10/03/easton-to-cle-elum-bicycling-the-john-wayne-pioneer-trail-where-railroading-is-remembered/
Most of us bicycling on the rail-trail through Iron Horse State Park in Washington limit ourselves to the 20-some miles between Cedar Falls and the 2.3-mile Snoqualmie Tunnel at Hyak.
The John Wayne Pioneer Trail doesn't stop at Hyak, however. It continues eastward through Washington to the Idaho border.
Recently I rode the 20-mile section from Hyak to beyond Easton to learn more about the trail east of the Snoqualmie Tunnel.
This is the high and dry side of the Cascades. …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.bikingbis.com/2011/09/16/hyak-to-easton-bicycling-the-high-dry-side-of-the-john-wayne-pioneer-trail/
On an overnight bike trip to the John Wayne Pioneer Trail last weekend, my biking buddy and I discovered that the newly reopened Snoqualmie Tunnel is drawing a lot of visitors.
Mostly they're day-trippers on bicycles, but some come by foot and at least a couple packed in with their llamas carrying their burdens.
The cyclists we talked with were taking advantage of the 18-mile downhill slope that greets them after they pass through the tunnel heading west.
They either came in groups and dropped off cars in Hyak and the Iron Horse Trail State Park lot in Cedar Falls, or contacted the shuttle service that carries passengers and bicycles to the Hyak trailhead …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.bikingbis.com/2011/08/04/an-overnight-bike-trip-to-the-snoqualmie-tunnel-finds-a-popular-destination/
I had heard about bicycling the John Wayne Pioneer Trail and the Snoqualmie Tunnel ever since moving here in 2000, but I didn't have the right bike until this spring.
With a day to myself, I threw the knobbies on my Rockhopper mountain bike and drove up to the Cedar Falls (exit 32 on I-90) trailhead to find out about it for myself.
Briefly, it was a great bike ride, and I can't wait to return with my camping gear. I rode the first leg of about 22 miles to the next trailhead at Hyak on the other side of the 2.3-mile long Snoqualmie Tunnel, looked around, and returned. I was shooting photos with my Canon Elph, and made a spur-of-the-moment decision to try a video. It appears at left.
The John Wayne Pioneer Trail is the old Chicago-Milwaukee-St. Paul-Pacific Railroad — aka The Milwaukee Road — that rolls two-thirds of the way across Washington state. About 100 miles of it is a packed gravel rail-to-trail maintained as part of the Iron Horse State Park from Cedar Falls west of the Cascades to the Columbia River to the east …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.bikingbis.com/2008/07/21/iron-horse-state-parks-john-wayne-pioneer-trail-in-washington/
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