Route: Rowena Loops : Hood River, Mosier and The Dalles

The Rowena Loops just outside of Mosier, OR has always been a beautiful place to ride. I have ridden there for many years, in different variations. It’s one of those areas where the challenge is connecting the trails and road in a sensible way, as it’s easy to burn yourself out on elevation gains or long long mileage loops. This route I think I hit the jackpot.

UPDATE : September 2025 – over the early summer of 2025 there was a large fire east of the Rowena Loops towards the Dalles. It caused a lot of damage, people lost their homes and the road was closed for a while. The road is still “locals” only, but perfectly fine to ride a bike. Please understand this and be respectful of the community you are passing through.

Ride by the Numbers

67miles with the option to cut out 13miles by omitting the Cherry Loop
5700ft with the option to cut out 1300ft by omitting the Cherry Loop
A road and an easy gravel version (links below)

The Route

Starting in Hood River, park where you please, I like the West side of town. Ride the multi use path out of Hood River on to Mosier. It’s a nice and wide with a little elevation change and some spectacular views down the gorge. Plus a novel tunnel in the rock formation to ride through. In summer this path can be busy with families and other users, so watch out. Early mornings tend to be ok, with just a few runners but coming back in the warm months you have to have a little courtesy for others. If you wanted to start in Mosier that’s fine also and there is a large gravel car park lot there. It would have off about 16miles.

Many years back when I raced the Gorge Roubaix I loved the Dry Creek climb that was part of the course. It’s pea sized gravel climb that goes up for about 6miles and just over 1200ft of elevation gain, pretty steady with an avg 4% grade. It winds up over the scenic hills of Mosier with beautiful views to the West and puts you within arms distance of The Dalles. Often my routes in this area will finish with this as a descent, because its great that way also. But this time I wanted to front load some of the climb and also get away from any traffic by jumping on the back roads, plus climbing on pea size gravel is a lot easier than descending.

At the top of Dry Creek there is a simple way down into The Dalles via 7 Mile Rd, but that’s a smidge boring and I didn’t want to miss out the good views and descending the fast and fun Rowena Loops. (which as you can guess is a loopy curvy road that goes down from Rowena point.) So rather than just dropping into The Dalles, I decided to connect to the top of the top of The Loops. This is done simply by two roads, one is fully gravel – Dell Rd W and the other is smooth but is a little longer work around – Marsh Cut Off Rd. Either are great, take your pick.

Routes

Dry Creek Up with Marsh (more rd version) – https://ridewithgps.com/routes/45874336, This is the version that climbs up Dry Creek and makes a loop of the Cherry Orchards in the Dalles.

Rowena Loops – This is fully paved version and makes a loop of the Cherry Orchards in the Dalles. – https://ridewithgps.com/routes/36895241 ,

The Rowena viewpoint

The views from Rowena viewpoint are spectacular, there is often a load of tourists up there so dont be discouraged. Your view is East and straight down the gorge, in early Summer the fields are littered with wild flowers. Come Autumn there is an amazing array of foliage color to be seen. The descent from the viewpoint into The Dalles is super fun on a bike, with twisty smooth roads, this is why I wanted to route back here and not take the quick way down to The Dalles. :-)

Food and Drink

When in The Dalles there are plenty of places to stop if you need food or drinks. Getting back on the route is easy, it’s a small town with easy to navigate roads. If you plan to do the full route with the Cherry Loop, now is the time to fuel up, as there’s a big climb coming. The re-fuel place I usually attend is a gas station just outside of town (marked on the map), Sinclair. They are super nice and bike friendly.

Just outside of downtown is what I call The Cherry Loop. This is a small bonus loop out of the Dalles before heading back West. It’s easily optional if you wished to cut it out. The loop starts hard with a second climb of the day up Cherry Heights road. Some sections have little shoulder but it’s not highly trafficked and cars aren’t generally going fast. It’s all great views on the climb and after views of mount hood and is pretty much all descending and rolling through Cherry orchards. Mid June through Mid August is cherry season, and the hills are alive with sweet cherries, but make sure you don’t eat too many, they might hinder you getting to the finish.

Heading Back

From this point on you are covering fairly well known way back. Heading West out of The Dalles you climb back over Rowena Loops. Another opportunity to soak in the views and chill at the top if you wish. Going over the top dropping down into Moiser with that easy little pedaling on flowy road. There’s a couple of viewpoints also before getting to Mosier if you want to take a look (they are marked in the map)

Mosier has a few little coffee shops, but if its late in the day, they might be closed. From here its back along the multi use path. (at the end of the path close to hood river is a water fountain)

This route is easily modify-able, and shorter or longer, more climby, less climby variations can be made. Even a straight ride out from Hood River to the top of the Rowena Loops would be great. (about 29miles out and back)

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Great Tools to have on this ride:

Pedros unbreakable tyre levers Park Multi Tool – I like the MTC10 Dynaplug – for those with tubeless

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