Trike Deschutes trail, Bend, Oregon - part 1

Bend Oregon is a very special kind of place. The town seems to wrap around the Deschutes River, and the town leverages the presence of the river. The town sort of "loves up" the river, by building the town activity centers around it.

They have made the Deschutes river trail, which is a misnomer, because there are literally bunches of "trail sections", one of which is the one that goes by the old mill district, which is where we did our triking for this page.

Some of the other sections are strictly for hiking, and others are mostly best for riding a mountain bike. But the section that goes past the old mill district is perfectly suited for either bikes or trikes or just walking. It's a real delight.

You can see in the far distance of about 20 miles the towering white mountain, which is Mount Bachelor, and looking further north, the Three Sisters, Broken top, and one or two other peaks in the cascades range. For our ride, we covered a little over 5 miles round trip total and it was a very pleasant ride.

We were staying on the west side of the Deschutes, just a block from the river, and it is a really nice location, because there are all kinds of services just a short ride or walk away. Grocery store - a nice new Safeway with lots of organics just a 5 minute walk to the west, and a bakery, coffee shop, and several other nice shops, some food trucks, and a few restaurants nearby. Looking east, downtown with lots more shops is only a 15 minute walk away, including banking, post office, and plenty of restaurants and other services and vendors.

If you take the colorado avenue bridge across to the east side of the Deschutes and follow the trail south, you run into the old mill district, which has a movie theater, lots of retaurants, REI, and several other stores.

Beyond that it's a nice level ride along the deschutes, with views of people doing their water sports in the river along the way, and of course the natural beauty of the river and it's rocky banks to the west. It's a delight that is meant to be savored.