Brian Hart of Washougal rides the Falls Creek trail / Photo by Mike Bitton

Whether you believe your mountain bike skills to be novice or expert, there’s a ride for you to enjoy in Southwest Washington. Lately I’ve been hanging out with the crew at Camas Bike and Sport in downtown Camas where owner Ed Fischer and staff ride narrow “singletrack” trails every day in nearby Lacamas Park.

But sometimes you’re in the mood for more than neighborhood trails. Fischer was able to turn me on to three rides everyone in Southwest Washington ought to know about.

Cold Creek

Just about due north of Washougal sits Larch Mountain. On a clear day in Vancouver, it’s easy to spot Larch as the highest point on the Eastern horizon. A few gravel roads wind around the West side of Larch, leading to trails of all abilities near the Cold Creek Campground.
A loosely knit group of riders known as the Cold Creek Mountain Bikers maintain the Cold Creek Trail, which is also used by horsemen and hikers. The mountain bike club hopes to establish a new, mountain-bike-only trail in the area to reduce conflicts between users.
Short out-and-back trips of as little as a mile are easily done from the Cold Creek Campground. Longer rides of up to 20 miles are also possible. Some folks have a driver shuttle them to the top, then meet the riders back at the campground.

Falls Creek/Old Man Pass

I was recently invited to ride Falls Creek with the gang from Camas Bikes, but opted to serve as a shuttle driver instead. I figured the level of expertise required for this ride was a couple of steps above my current ability, and I didn’t want to come home injured.
Riders began the day at the top of Old Man Pass (shown as Oldman Pass on some maps), above Carson, Wash., and meandered up, around and mostly down the mountains of the Gifford Pinchot National Forest for more than 20 miles before ending near Falls Creek Falls. When the riders regrouped at the end of the ride, there had been no injuries after all. Next time, I’m riding!

Ape Canyon and the Plains of Abraham

If you’d like to experience a truly bizarre landscape from the saddle, consider Ape Canyon and the Plains of Abraham. The out-and-back trail begins at the Ape Canyon Campground above Cougar, Wash., on the Mt. St. Helens National Volcanic Monument.

After a steep beginning, the single-track trail meanders through terrain blasted by the mountain’s violent eruption in 1980. I’ve yet to see this area, but friends who have ridden it say it’s the closest thing to riding on the moon you could ever experience.

Resources: The full-service Camas Bike and Sport shop sits in downtown Camas at 240 NE 3rd Ave. Add the zip code — 98607 — to avoid any Internet map search confusion.

For the Cold Creek ride, it’s much easier to find experienced riders than maps. Ask the staff at Camas Bikes, as customers tend to let the shop know where their next adventures are. As for maps, the most accurate resource I found was the Washington Road and Recreation Atlas made by Benchmark Maps of Medford, Ore. Internet searches for keywords like “mountainbike,” “washington” and “coldcreek” produce results on an array of mountain biking web sites, and are worth the time investment.

A great map exists for the Falls Creek and Ape Canyon rides, $10. From the company’s web site, order the “Hood River, Oregon Mountain Biking Map” produced by Salem, Ore.-based Adventure Maps (www.adventuremaps.net). Printed on waterproof and tear resistant paper, it offers enough detail to get you to and from the abovementioned locations, as well as more than a dozen mountain bike rides in Oregon.

Mike Bitton is a contributing writer to The Voice.