Trails & Trees - Part 15 - Hiawatha Trail

Thursday, 17 August 2017

This was truly one of the highlights of our trip -- a rail-trail through near wilderness. We camped overnight by just pulling off the dirt road in the National Forest in an unmarked, but obviously well-used, campsite.

The Hiawatha Trail is noted for having 10 tunnels and 7 trestles along its almost 16-mile route. It’s also all downhill from East Portal, Montana, to Pearson, Idaho. My kind of mountain trail. (If you want to ride back up, the return grade is only 2%, although it’s relentless for 15 miles.) The only downside to this trail is that roadbed is not as smooth as many rail-trails. It's better suited to mountain bikes than our tour bikes.

We took a leisurely ride, stopping to read all the interpretive posts along the way that told a lot about this history of the original rail line.

The route starts at East Portal in Montana -- a few miles down a dirt road from I-90. We started about 8:30 AM, so it was quite cool.

Just a 100 ft or so from the start of the trail is the first, and longest tunnel, 1.8 miles (2.9 km) long. As cool as it was outside, it was even cooler in the tunnel (about 40°F, 4.5°C). This picture also shows the reason for the tunnel -- it avoids a pass that goes up 1000 ft higher.

The other end of the tunnel. The Hiawatha Trail has 10 tunnels, but one of the tunnels is now bypassed because it has become unsafe due to a geologic fault running through it. However you still go through 10 tunnels, because the returning uphill shuttle bus stops at the Idaho end of the 1.8 mile long tunnel, so you have to return through this tunnel to get back to your vehicle.

One of the tunnels is shared with the access road. Fortunately, we were early enough not to have to worry about shuttle bus traffic.

The scenery along this trail is nothing short of spectacular. One of the seven trestles is in the middle of the photo.

A closer look at a trestle.

Biking across the trestles really didn’t feel very dangerous -- the path is quite broad.

When the trestle is straight, you can almost not realize you are high above the ground.

The downhill end of the trail in Pearson, Idaho, is an understated turn-around for the shuttle bus.

These tree trunks at East Portal are a reminder of the huge forest fires that swept through this area in 1912.

Overall, this is a well-run, family-friendly trail with spectacular scenery. Just be sure that your bike lights are fully charged and bring back-up flashlights “just in case”!