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Tumalo Ridge Trail
Trail Snapshot:
Trail Description
E-bikes NOT allowed on Tumalo Ridge
Tumalo Ridge Trail runs from Skyliner trailhead to Swede Ridge shelter. It starts at Skyliner Sno Park, and heads up Tumalo Ridge via a series of switchbacks to a nice overlook on the East end of the ridge. This is a beautiful trail, with great views and a steep side-slope. Once at the top of the ridge at the East end, things get a fairly technical starting with a very rocky 180 degree turn around edge of the ridge.
Next you’ll hit a series of back to back, steep, rocky climbs that test your endurance and low speed bike handling skills. Eventually the trail levels off and opens up to a few nice views of the Cascade Range.
The trail soon spits you out on a fire road climb which takes you up to Swede Shelter. The Shelter is hard to see, so be mindful of some trails off to the left of the road at the intersection of the Sector 16, Swede Ridge and SST trails.
A favorite local’s loop is up Tumalo Ridge, over on Swede Ridge, down Southfork and back on Tumalo Creek Trail.
60 Seconds on the Tumalo Ridge Trail
This trail is maintained by Central Oregon Trail Alliance.
Rode up Tumalo Ridge 10-25-2024. No trees at all, and no snow either! Rode fantastic.
Trail clear of trees and snow till the top. Past the top a few snow patches and 2 down trees both about 10” as well as a leaner. Snow looked endless at double track
There was one snow drift that you had to walk … maybe 40 feet. Otherwise totally clear and excellent.
Trees now clear. Thanks Don, Erika, John, Mike , Ashby and Missy
All clear of snow! Just 3-4 trees across the FS road. Singletrack has been cleared nicely!
Ran up tumalo ridge on 5/21. Numerous trees down, but only a few big snags that you couldn’t climb over. Snow started in earnest at 5500′, where the doubletrack/road portion starts. Large drifts up to the shelter that will be a week or two before they melt off enough to get around. Fortunately the snow was firm enough that I wasn’t post holing. Glad I didn’t have a bike on this adventure. The lower single track portion is riding well aside from the trees.
Ran from Skyliners TH up 3 miles to small clearing where a trail sign is. only one small patch of snow on trail near mile 3. big trees down around mile 1 ish and more around 2-2.25. will post locations later today
trail sign is on a down tree also :)
Ran into a nice couple with e-bikes about half way up. (They were climbing, I was descending.) They were convinced it was open to e-bikes because ‘there was an explicit sign at the start!’
At the bottom I discovered new (to me) signage indicating that Tumalo *Creek* trail is open to e-bike pedal assist… but there are no explicit No E-Bike signs for Tumalo *Ridge* (just the boilerplate No Motorized Vehicles sign).
Dunno what the time/money budget for these things are but it seems some clarifying signs could help e-riders do the right thing.
Road climb has about 100 feet of hike-a-bike snow left. That’s it.
As of today LOTS of snow still on the road. Expect about half the road to be snow. 4 trees down. One in manzanita near fire road and 3 down in road. All #handjobs
All trees cleared. Only one patch of snow to walk all others you can ride through or around.
Tree down ~ 2 miles up.
Snow levels at 5300
I went yesterday as well. Big snow patch right under the shadow of Swede Ridge, then patchy (kinda rideable) snow from there to the shelter.
Prime conditions right now, get after it!
I just cleared trail from deadfall. 6 trees were down
Clear of trees and snow up to the first big bend on the double track. Deep snow after that once the trail goes east and is in the shade.
fully cleared this afternoon. Left a few dumb trees on the double track as you can easily ride next to them
cleared several trees with a hand saw. Should be maybe clear? We didn’t make it to the top, but made it to the road. One 16″ ish tree we could only move partway off trail. will need to be cut.
All clear. Riding well! A few pine needles but they are getting broken up quickly.
One smallish snow patch left on the doubletrack. Big tree still down on the doubletrack.
Someone has cut part of the tree away. The last snowpatch has melted as well. All rideable now.
Basically clear of snow until half way up the double track. A total of about 1/2 mile of snow you can’t ride/run around, up to about 2′ deep. Last 1/4 mile to the shelter isn’t too bad. One really big tree down about half way up the long straight stretch of double track. Pretty rotten.
Big tree down about half way on the rolling section after the big single track climb
Thanks for the report. All clear
riding well.
Shame the log ramp at the top of the ridge is gone. Reallyhope this was necessary maintenance and not someone just cutting it away
Only one 10′ patch of snow that manage to reach completely across double track, otherwise ride-able all the way.
A pair of 12″ diameter trees down across the double track about .5 miles below the Swede shelter. I was able to crawl under, but not easy to get around.
Pretty much clear. A few snow patches on the road but otherwise clear all the way to the shelter. I was surprised!
All clear of deadfall up to the road now.
The snow on the road isn’t melting very fast even with the warm temps. Mornings the end of the week into this weekend could probably be ridden on a fat bike crust cruising. Up to the intersection with the road, though it’s in great shape.
A few ice/snow spots left but mostly mud free. Cleared 3 small trees with my folding saw but there is a monster up top just before the lookout point (~3ft diameter). Decent ride around in place at least. Turned around ~1/4 mile into the fire road where the snow gets deeper.
Hiked the lower half this evening. Still some packed snow covered spots down low, along with some muddy areas, but up above was completely dry.
Frozen ground and light dusting of powder for most of the single track made for some great riding today. Deeper snow up on the double track but rideable on a fat bike at low psi (~4-5). Deadfall is clear
Lots of ice near Skyliners sno park, then gets better the higher you go. It seems to stay frozen if overnight temps were freezing.
Trees have been cleared. I cut the double track trees all the way to the edge of the road. But only removed a small chunk for bikes. If the car needs to go down the road they can move the other parts of the trees
Ten trees down across the trail: three on the singletrack above the switchbacks and six on the twin-track. Excellent dirt.
Correction: seven trees across the twin-track.
Will be clearing tomorrow along with southfork if all goes well
One big (20″) tree down almost at the TH where the trail parallels the road to Tumalo Lake.
Still wacking Snowbrush, but some has been defoliated. I assume by caterpillars.
No snow to ride over.
No snow or mud all the way to Swede Shelter. The Snowbush has reached across on the downhill to the fire road.
Entire trail is clear to ride. A couple snow piles but nothing you can’t ride through
Single track sections 100% good to go! Large patches of snow still on the fire road would make ascending annoying, but are okay on the descent. Lots of LARGE puddles on the fire road as well.
Continuous, deep, sticky snow around 5300′. Hopefully this next warm snap melts it off a little bit.
Perfect dirt, no snow.
Is this trail open right now? I went to ride it today and there’s a sign from the USFS detouring you away from it, it didn’t say closed just said detour pointing you to the tumalo creek trail.
It’s open. The sign was originally part of a detour around the missing bridge on the Tumalo Creek trail. Seems that everyone is just walking across the creek and ignoring the detour anyway.
Thanks, it had me a bit confused.
FWIW, there’s an aggressive sage grouse that apparently has nested too close to the trail. She made her presence known to me yesterday about 20 yds before the first lower switchback and kept up her chase until I got to the second switchback. Be careful!
Haha I was going to post about that grouse but forgot. Came right up to me while I stopped and thought she would peck at my legs but didn’t. But then as I started up again, the chase was on ! The coloring made me think it was a Spruce Grouse, but they’re not known to live in these parts
Yes! She made me ride uphill faster on Tuesday :)
Whew…glad it’s not just me!
Woah boy, I had an encounter with him down closer to the fork with the Tumalo Creek trail. Not overly aggressive, but bold! Got right up next to me. If you see it again, the male blue (sooty subspecies in this area) grouse has the yellow patch above the eye and the female lacks this and is specked brown instead of mostly gray. The male is likely defending a nest site as this time of year. Just if you were curious! :)
No grouse, today.
Riding well and somewhat getting dusty on south facing slope. Bushes in sections Need some major trimming.
Thanks to Bill; trail is riding well and no deadfall.
I cleared 10 more trees. It’s all rideable to the shelter now but is still in need of some work.
I cleared about 10 trees. There are still several left. It is in need of some housekeeping as sections have become overgrown and there’s a lot of trail debris.
Still the same. Singletrack is clear of snow and downfall. The doubletrack has at least a dozen downed trees and just a couple of avoidable snow patches.
Trail is good, but you do have to navigate minor deadfall. There is a little snow, but not much. I did not continue past shelter.
Where were the deadfall located? On the singletrack or the doubletrack?
Doubletrack.