Northwest Trails Trip Video

On their drive north to the Seattle Bicycle Expo, Neil and Phil stopped along the way to ride a few of the Pacific Northwest's most renowned trails. Although the weather wasn't always cooperative, they rode their newly built Rohloff-equipped Surly Krampuses in Olympia, Washington, Portland, Oregon, and Redding, California. Watch our video above from some of the best singletrack in the country.

Cycle Monkey Attends the North American Handmade Bicycle Show

Katie, Neil, and Aaron at our booth

A week after the Seattle Bike Expo, some of the Cycle Monkey team headed east to Charlotte, North Carolina for the ever-impressive North American Handmade Bicycle Show, also known as NAHBS. The show is a chance for small and mid-size framebuilders to showcase their artistry and craft to consumers and fellow bike builders. The show is full of the most exciting customized bikes you’ll ever see, where no cost is spared in producing beautiful and functional works of art. Cycle Monkey has been exhibiting at the show for the last five years, and this year we were excited to have a larger booth space to showcase some of our most popular builds from the Monkey Lab.

Neil and Phil Ride into the Sunset in Olympia, Washington

On our way north to the Seattle Bicycle Expo, Neil and I stopped just west of Olympia, Washington to ride the dense woods of Capitol State Forest. The first half of the ride – the climb – was very scenic and relaxing after a long day of driving, but the descent portion of the ride turned into a bit of a fiasco. The ride was incredibly fun for the most part, but it became another trail that we couldn’t ride at our full potential, and we had to promise ourselves we would return in better conditions.

After a long, winding drive through the woods just west of Olympia, Washington’s state capital, we reached the trailhead deep in the forest. Capitol State Forest is a relatively isolated area, and as we drove through the trees and clearings it was a nice break from the monotony of the freeway. We had been driving north toward Seattle for hours, so we were excited to be getting out into the wilderness after a long day of driving.

Neil and Phil Ride Redding in a Rainstorm

On the way to up to the Pacific Northwest for the Seattle Bicycle Expo, Neil and I stopped in Redding, California to get a ride in and help break up the twelve hour drive. We didn’t know much about the trails in the area before we got on the road, but we had heard that Redding had some good riding so we decided to make the stop. While driving north on Highway 5 through the Central Valley, we looked up a few specific trail options on our smartphones and decided to just pick the trail that sounded the most fun and take our chances. Little did we know that this spur-of-the-moment stop would be one of the most fun and adventurous rides either of us had been on in a while.

Neil and Phil at the Seattle Bicycle Expo

Neil and I drove from Berkeley to Seattle for the Seattle Bicycle Expo on the weekend of March 1-2, where we had a great time meeting the locals and sharing our products and services with Seattle cyclists. The turnout for the expo was fantastic even with the wet, grey weather that came through that weekend. Most of the consumers exploring the booths at the show were wet and wearing cycling gear, having ridden through the rain to get to the expo center. The sheer number of the commuters at the expo that weekend was a testament to the bicycle community in Seattle: nasty weather doesn’t stop Seattle commuters, and their ranks only seem to be growing.