I am planning a trip for my wife and I to Glacier NP in Montana with a run over to lower Washington into Oregon and Hells Canyon for the last week of August and the first week in September. Any members familiar with the area around Hells Canyon? Do's, Don'ts, or must see's? Places to eat or camp too.

 

Access to Hells Canyon by road is pretty limited. I camped in campground at the south end coming in from the Idaho side. The campground was owned and operated by Bonneville Power (I think) and was nice. However there are very limited options for supplies and restaurants. From there I traveled north on the Idaho side to Lewiston and camped in a city park. It had tent sites and RV sites. In Lewiston there are several vendors doing jetboat trips through the canyon. These range from half day to multi-day trips. I highly recommend a jetboat trip through rapids if you've never experienced it. It is a hoot, but be prepared to get wet.

The Oregon side of the canyon is very sparsely populated and has limited facilities.

The qualifier to all of this is that it was 12 years ago when I made this trip; some things may have changed since then. The ride north along the Idaho side of the canyon was great though.

 

Thanks John, I did some checking and it some things have changed out there, but not by much.

 

This past summer, middle of August, our Roseburg Oregon HOG club did a group ride to Hells Canyon. The first night we stayed in Baker City and departed for the canyon from there. We took Hwy 86 East. Just past Halfway (a town ) we turned north on a forest road #39 which took us to the Canyon. 86 is a beautiful motorcycle road. 39 was paved all the way, narrow in spots winding through the forest. There are overlooks you can stop at and are worth while. Coming out of the canyon area we stopped in the town of Joseph. A beautiful little town that sits beside the mountains. We had about 17 members with us and didn't have the time in our schedule to stay there for more than lunch. The consensus was that we should allow more time to spend the night there so we could see more. It is a good trip and Eastern Oregon has some fantastic M/C roads. A good trip that we would like to do again. If you are interested I could send you some photos from that area. pm me and let me know. Enjoy the ride.
Mike

 

I rode through there in late July and it was very warm! The asphalt was melting to a black goo in many areas. I had no idea those deep canyons get so hot.

 

That black goo combined with the THRONGS of black Mormon crickets crossing the road can be a b-eotch!!! However, haven't you found that most good rides take a little sacrifice to get to?

Lots of bugs when I went through there in July...hit the canyon from the ID side about an hour before sunset. Was riding with a buddy and had left Brian Head, UT that morning (that's right, 800 + miles on the day) overnighting in Baker City. Beautiful area to ride.

Watch for the Bambi family as they ALL come down to the water's edge towards the late afternoon/early evening to drink up. You'd think there was a Budweiser sign lit up down there or something!