Day 12: Clarkston, WA to Winchester, ID: Up, up and more up

Updated: Jun 24, 2023

Friday June 16, 2023, 43 miles (69 km) - Total so far: 522 miles (840 km)

Today’s route:

Let’s just say we did not fully appreciate what we were getting ourselves into when we set out this morning. We met a very nice couple from Alabama while at breakfast - Terri and Rusty Burns. Terri had family in the area and new the roads pretty well - she called her cousin to confirm her thinking. Her advice was to take the new HW95 up the mountain into Winchester rather than the old Winchester Grade which is where the ACA maps and app were guiding us. The Winchester Grade had a much steeper grade than HW95. Thank goodness we listened, because the HW95 route was challenging enough. Basically, today’s route was up, up and up all day with the most challenging climb coming at the end. Check out the elevation chart below. While today’s ride wasn’t the longest it was most certainly the most challenging day we’ve had. We are evaluating tomorrow’s plan…

It takes a little while to work your way out of Clarkston and across the bridge to Lewiston. It was also quite busy in the morning. Once you’re on the other side if the bridge you follow a bike trail for quite awhile along the Snake River.

We were also planning on camping tonight in Winchester, as there didn’t appear to be any lodging available. Fortunately, we stopped for lunch at Drover’s Run. We got to talking to Kathy, one of the servers, who told us that there were some Airbnb cabins in Winchester and she would call the owner to see if any were available. Amazingly, one was available at a reasonable price - although we would have paid almost any price! Great little cabin, and we were able to have a nice dinner at the Winchester Kitchen & Pub.