An Underexposed Special: The Oregon Coast Road Trip

Underexposed is a self-shot and produced series of documentary short-films by Pivot Cycles athlete Brice Shirbach. The series is dedicated to showcasing mountain bike advocacy and stewardship while exploring trails across the globe. Join Brice as he explores the relationship between community and trails

US HIGHWAY 101 runs for 1500 miles from as far south as Los Angeles, CA to as far north as Olympia, WA. It's an iconic route that hits its peak along the 363 miles of Oregon's rugged and stunning coastline. Oregon's coast is split fairly evenly between sandy beaches and rocky shorelines, and is often accented by the colliding forces of mountains and oceans. It's no surprise that it is one of the country's most popular stretches of highway for starry eyed roadtrippers, with thousands of scenic vistas and numerous quaint communities awaiting endeavoring motorists. The coast range is home to more than just pretty views and cute towns, with a growing number of top notch mountain bike trails up and down Oregon's staggeringly beautiful shoreline. So, I went ahead and rented a big sprinter van and decided to see a few of these places firsthand.

Three communities in particular stand above the rest on Oregon's coast: Klootchy Creek in Cannon Beach, Big Creek in Newport, and Whiskey Run in Bandon. All three offer up diverse and stellar riding opportunities, and while a few hundred miles might separate them, they share a sense of kinship that comes from digging, riding, and advocating on the coast. All three trail networks are a part of the Ride the Dirt Wave series, now in its 3rd year of celebrating Oregon Coast shreddery; with each location serving as a stop for the summer festival and race series.

I don’t know what Paradise looks like for you, but I have a good idea of what it looks like for me. It includes a beautiful coastline, some rolling and rugged mountains that jut up against the ocean, massive evergreen trees with fuzzy green trunks, and the best dirt on the planet blanketing the forest floor. But that’s just me. Now let's say a place like this exists and it also happens to have rad trails being built and maintained by equally rad communities.

It's easy to be a bit overwhelmed by a place like the Oregon Coast, with equal measures of captivating beauty, friendly faces, and brilliant trails. There just aren't a lot of places in the world that are this...magnetic. The Oregon Coast isn't very easy to get to as the 101 isn't exactly a super highway, which might explain why so many people who pay this place a visit end up as locals. It's never easy to leave this place, so who knows, one of these days I might just need to take a road trip back out and stay a while longer.