PCOR - Oregon Part?

[E-350]

Hey guys

Just about planning our summer trip and we'll go north from the Bay Area.

Rig: E-350 Ext, RWD, AirLocker, 35" tires, 6" lift

Anyone done especially the Oregon part of the Pacific Crest Overlanding Route? Is this doable with 2WD?

In case you have done other parts, I'd also be interested. Perhaps we might just take off from the Bay to Yosemite and from there north.

[vandiesel]

Are you talking about the backcountry discovery route?

[E-350]

Yeah, I read about this as well. Might be a part of this one here, which seems to be the „parallel vehicle route“ of the PCT
https://nimblvehicles.com/the-pacifi...verland-route/

[E-350]

But I think the backcountry road is currently blocked or so?!

[vandiesel]

I think post fire this year all bets are off. Oregon isn't a particularly well run state and is very prone to closing anything they can't maintain or fix. I'd anticipate a slew of "closed due to covid" and "closed due to fire" all over. The best option in my mind would be to make your own backcountry route by winging it with all the public land options we have.

[carringb]

The whole Mt Jefferson area is currently a no-go, all the way up to and including the Clackamas River watershed. They're trying to get Ollalie lake open by July. There's a LOT of down trees, so it's really not passable on most routes, those that are clear have VERY heavy logging traffic.

South of Highway 22, it's all open. It's all doable in 2WD, but there's some gnarly sections near Summit lake. I wouldn't recommend some sections if its not dry. But there's still many workarounds that'll keep you off pavement.

Once you get closer to Mt. Hood, you get out of the fire affected zone again. There's plenty of VERY scenic alternate routes west and east of the PCOR so I wouldn't cancel your trip just because that one 50 mile section isn't passable.

[E-350]

Thanks for the feedback so far. We're still not 100% sure which way to go.

But we'll somehow start between Lake Tahoe and the Oregon/ California border and go north.

One idea was to start in Tahoe, go up to Crate/ Diamond Lake and from there drive West using the Oregon Backcountry Route 6 towards the Coast. From there back home the quick way on the highway.

Based on what I saw up to now the OBR and the PCOR seems to be fairly comparable in terms of difficulty, PCOR perhaps slightly more difficult in some places. Both await you with possible downed tress :-)

Feedback from OOHVA was that above 6000ft there might still be some snow towards early June, but we're more towards end of June/ early July.