L'Eroica Dreams

The roads and scenery around Trout Lake, Washington bring you within a few kilometers of  two significant Cascade volcanoes, Mt. Adams and Mt. St. Helens.

With my son-in-law as ride-mate, we took on a loop ride from the Lower Falls Campground in Gifford Pinchot National Forest through Trout Lake and over the western flank of Mt. Adams. The ride includes some very quiet roads, breath taking scenery, steep ascents and equally enjoyable descents. For a map of the ride, go here: Lewis River-Trout Lake Loop.

On family camping trips, the Moseman tandem is usually the machine of choice. This time, my wife decided she didn’t want the punishment. I don’t blame her. She and I have ridden this loop before, albeit without the extra 33K of road between the loop and the camping. My original mapping of the ride had the distance pegged incorrectly and my son-in-law pointed this out before we set off. I wish he hadn’t said anything.

The weather on Saturday, August 6 was beautiful: sunny skies, temperatures in the low 70’s with a light breeze at our back when we started. We thought about that as we knew that the return would be into that same wind.

The first significant climbing occurs after you make the turn toward Trout Lake. The road is perfect, though, with just a few patches of gravel. The gradient is easily managed, even with the relatively high gearing that I cannot escape. We took just about two hours to get to the Trout Lake Ranger Station where we refueled with water and sandwiches and some excellent homemade cookies. Prior to that stop, though, I choked down my first experience with “Gu.” All I can say is that I hoped it helped me in some small way because the experience otherwise is not pleasant.

It’s not long after Trout Lake that you begin the climb of Mt. Adams. Here, the angle is more significant, with steep pitches that are followed by milder climbs and even some descents. The sun was on us, too, so we doffed the helmets and rode like hard men. Phillip was kind to me, letting me catch him as we made our way up the 20K or more of climbing.

Views to Mt. Adams are wonderful here and we had been teased with peeks at the western slopes as we made our way down to Trout Lake. After finally topping out, we rode the relatively flat, then steeply descending road to its junction with our return.

On average, the return is downhill, though there are some rollers that remind you that what looks easy on paper rarely is. Add to this the wind dimension, which at times was blowing quite hard in our faces. That meant crouching over the handlebars and creating the sore necks that we nursed with beers late in the day.

By the end, we had logged 116K of fantastic riding, averaging 23K/hour. As I made my final turn into the campground, I felt proud. Proud, that is, until I realized that to approximate L’Eroica’s long ride, I’d have to make the circuit all over again.