Saturday, July 23, 2016

Riding the Rails

 

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Yesterday we decided to play tourist here in Joseph, Oregon, and become “railriders” on an abandoned portion of the Idaho Northern and Pacific Railroad. Unlike riding our bikes on a rail trail, in this case we actually pedaled this strange contraption right on the rails themselves.

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Joseph Rail Riders designed these four wheel tandem bikes with adjustable recumbent seats so people can actually ride the rails under their own pedal power. The starting point is just a couple blocks from Five Peaks RV Park where we’re staying.

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The scenery is just gorgeous around here, and it was fun seeing it this way. It really made us long for our old recumbent bicycles.

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We pedaled six downhill miles to the turn around point in Enterprise. They’ve designed a turntable to rotate each “bike” around for the ride back. Pretty clever.

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The turn around point has a porta-potty and a couple of young entrepreneurs selling bottled water and cold drinks for $1.00.

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It was an enjoyable couple of hours. We saw ospreys in their nest, a hawk, many, many deer, and a herd of elk. There were at least a dozen but they ran off into the woods before we could get a photo.

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Although the grade is only 1.5% we were surprised at what a workout it was pedaling back after we turned around. The last “bike” manned by an employee actually has a motor and if someone needs assistance going back they can get behind and give them a push.

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Such idyllic scenery.

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We tend to avoid touristy things but this was a lot of fun and something totally different. Today we go back to our usual routine, with one last hike in the Eagle Cap Wilderness.

14 comments:

  1. How cool is that!?! I have never heard of such a thing. Great scenery and exercise to boot!

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  2. Now that is one unique experience! I bet you could peddle much faster than you thought you could if a real train came up behind you... :cD

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  3. Now that is a really cool tour. What fun! The scenery looks beautiful.

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  4. These folks were mentioned in the new issue of Overland Journal. I thought you might enjoy their blog.

    http://www.freshoffthegrid.com/

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  5. We have reservations to do that in Sept! Thanks for the review. :)

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  6. Wow, what fun! It would be great for rail buffs, like us, too.

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  7. That looks like SO much fun!

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  8. What fun! Looks like it is a "group" ride rather than you just come when you want and take one out a la renting a pedal boat at a lake. Really lovely scenery and a great idea by the locals.

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  9. So cool! This sounded like so much fun...well, until you said you went down hill six miles. I knew you had to come back up:) Clever to have a car with a motor. I'm sure they use it often. The scenery is spectacular.

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  10. What a blast that must have been!

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  11. I have always wanted to try this. What beautiful country to travel through!

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