— by Susan McBain —
Dan Christopherson at Wildlife Cycles in Eastsound
Biking is big in the San Juans. And the number of bikers is going to keep growing, especially in the summer, says Dan Christopherson, owner of Wildlife Cycles in Eastsound.
“First, the number of tourists keeps increasing, and lots of them are bikers—individuals, families and bike touring groups. Second, use of electric bikes is really picking up, and those let older people continue to ride into their 70s and 80s.”
Dan should know what’s happening. He opened the first bike shop in the San Juan Islands in 1978, in a converted chicken shack on Lopez. When Wildlife Cycles, started by Brett McFarland and Jill Sherman in 1989, came up for sale in 2008, he bought the business and moved to Orcas. The shop now has a satellite rental facility at the ferry dock, so customers can ride bikes from the moment they arrive.
“About 20–25 percent of our business is bike rentals,” Dan says. “But the majority is sales of new and used bikes, accessories, and service and repairs. We sell new Trek road, mountain and electric bikes, and we work on all standard and electric bikes.
“This is our 26th year of hosting the Wildlife 100 tour of the San Juan Islands, which happens this Sunday, the 20th. The $10 donation goes to the Orcas Park and Rec, which provides year-round activities for youth, teens, adults, and families. The Tour will start at Wildlife Cycles at 6 a.m. but anyone can meet up with the group at any point of the route. This is an unsupported ride.
Schedule:
6:00am: Meet at Wildlife Cycles
9:15am: Catch ferry from Orcas to Lopez, arrive Lopez 9:50am
1:05pm: Catch ferry from Lopez to San Juan, arrive around 1:55pm
5:30pm: catch ferry from Friday Harbor to Orcas, arrive around 6:20pm
Food and Refreshments in Friday Harbor at the Marina prior to catching the ferry back to Orcas
For mmore information, call Wildlife Cycle at 360-376-4708 or go to https://wildlifecycles.com/wildlife-100/.)
Dan continues, “We also sponsor island bike rides; every Thursday in the summer there’s a social bike ride for whoever wants to join in. And we also have summer Thursday night BMX rides at the Camp Orkila dirt track from 6:30 t0 8 p.m. There is no charge and BMX bikes and helmets are provided.”
As far as riding on Orcas Island, Dan says West Beach, North Beach, and Buckhorn Beach are all good destinations. Serious bikers can ride out to Deer Harbor or up Mt. Constitution. “In fact, Mt. Constitution is one of the three major hill climbs for bikers in Washington,” says Dan (the others are Mt. Rainier and Hurricane Ridge in the Olympics). For families, he recommends going up North Beach to Bartell, then to Terrill Beach, Buckhorn Road to Buckhorn Beach, and back on Mt. Baker Rd., cutting through the Crescent Beach Preserve trail to ride back into Eastsound.
“Both San Juan and Lopez have better roads for bikes than Orcas,” says Dan, “with four-foot paved shoulders on each side on main roads. We need more roads like that here. The county has improved the main road from the ferry dock to Deer Harbor Rd., and it plans to make improvements from Nordstrom Lane to the Exchange. But what I’d like to see is four-foot shoulders all the way to Moran State Park. And shoulders on North Beach Rd. from School Rd. to Mt. Baker Rd. would be a big help for school kids. Many kids could ride to school but don’t because parents don’t think it’s safe.
“Look at Mt. Baker Rd. Some people thought widening it was a waste of money. But it’s used much more by bikers, joggers, and walkers than it was before, now that it’s wide enough that people feel safe using it. And increasing use of bikes could reduce car use by both residents and tourists.”
Something we’d all like to see!
As an aside, Wildlife Cycles let me try out one of their electric bicycles the other day, and it’s a real game-changer.
I love bikes: the ‘green’ of them, the way you see more and see more slowly from a bike than from a car, the exercise. I applaud those who use bikes instead cars to go into town. I do it myself.
That said, I absolutely dread going to Deer Harbor in the summer when huge groups of bicyclists are strung out from Island Supply to the marina. The road is a series of blind corners with nowhere to pass safely and no shoulders. For much of the way there is a cliff going up on one side and a cliff going down on the other side, and to pass a bicycle one has to cross the centerline and pray that there is nobody coming around the corner & if there is, that the next bike forward won’t be so close that you don’t have room to dodge back. Or that there is not a bike tour coming toward you with an oncoming car going around the oncoming bicycles, crossing the centerline and coming at you around the same blind corner.
I wish that people would stop pushing the Deer Harbor road as a good place for bicycles to tour. It is spectacularly beautiful, but it is not safe for that use — not for the bikes and not for the cars that have to go around them.
As the economy grows and tourism flourishes here, the number of cars isn’t going to decrease, even as the numbers of cyclists increases. The roads can’t be made wider, certainly no the Deer harbor Rd. So … how do cars and bicycles coexist?
I am of the mind that some format stating Bicycle Etiquette be created and disseminated through cycling tours or Wildlife Cycles. I suspect that most visiting cyclists don’t have a clue as to how narrow and dangerous our roads can be. A friend who is a cyclist mentioned the stretch past the Nigretto property just south of the golf course. There is no, ZERO, shoulder and no place for cyclists except in the roadway.
Drivers are told to share the road. OK !! Then let those rules of cycling state that bicyclists must ride single file unless they are outside of the “fog line” (the white stripe).
And so forth. The folks who promote and benefit from cycling should take the initiative to educate cycling visitors to our island so that those folks are safe, enjoy their adventure on Orcas, AND allow auto traffic to move efficiently and safely on our roads. Drivers … don’t forget to HONK.
ALL RESIDENTS OF ORCAS Please be oh so careful of the bicycling tourists in the summer! Last summer Randy Gaylord’s office decided to charge me with two counts of CRIMINAL reckless driving ONLY because some bicyclists SAID that I passed them too close. No one saw this, I didn’t hit (or come close to hitting) anyone. Several days later when they were on Lopez Island they told a deputy there that I had done this on Orcas. They described my car and license plate (also saying that I was in a line of three cars that did this). Anyhow, I could have gone to prison for four years! The result was that I had to hire a criminal attorney to defend me ($5,000) and the attorney got the charge reduced to one count of illegal passing, which cost me an additional $500 fine and 10 hours of community service.
Nobody was hit, nobody was hurt, but believe me, the bicyclists have all the power because they choose to be on a bike! By the way, I had lived on Orcas for 19 years and had never had a ticket for anything until this point…
“A friend who is a cyclist mentioned the stretch past the Nigretto property just south of the golf course. There is no, ZERO, shoulder and no place for cyclists except in the roadway.” That’s one of the challenge areas for consistent shoulders. It’s a high rock wall on one side and a huge number of old trees on the other.
I agree that there is no evidence that bikes will reduce cars. They come in addition to cars. From what I can see, they bring their bikes on their cars.
I wish both drivers (including tourists) and bikers would pay closer attention to the rules and the realities of the roads. We simply stay well behind bikes unless we can see a long clear path to pass. But when it’s 15 bikes in a row, that’s frustrating. There should certainly be some driving/biking flyers distributed, including to tourist car arrivals.
And what are the brands of electric bikes available? A friend is raving about hers.
I wasted a fair amount of energy advocating that the planned Orcas Road improvements in the vicinity of Nordstrom Lane be a demonstration of a bike lane, separate from but adjacent to the roadway rather than attempting to accommodate bicycle traffic on widened road shoulders. Not only would this be safer for bicylists, it would also allow our roads to retain their narrow, rural character.
I would love to see our SJCDPWs be proactive in adjusting to increased bicycle traffic.
Kudos to all bike riders who ride for transportation purposes; I admire not only your fitness, but your actions and commitment to a “greener” lifestyle. I respect locals for these choices, but I respectfully disagree with Dan Christopherson that we need to put 4 foot shoulders on both sides of our roads – for bike tourists – nor can we have these radical road revisions, due to the lay of the land here on Orcas, and the prohibitive costs.
I like Fred Klein’s idea of separate but adjacent bike lanes better. In places where we have mature trees, we can ill-afford to tear down MORE mature forests along our roadsides for bicyclists – especially bike tourists. Locals have argued this fact for years – we LIKE our roads rural, our speeds slower, and our trees and hills intact.
Although I appreciate Mr. Christopherson’s effort to put bike rentals at Orcas Landing, which hopefully will encourage people to leave their cars at Anacortes, (certainly cheaper for them in terms of ferry fares) this has significantly affected traffic to and from the ferry landing- and let’s be honest – Mr. Christopherson is benefitting financially from these bicycle rentals; probably the biggest factor for having them. It’s a business.
Instead of tearing down MORE mature roadside trees to widen shoulders for bicyclists, perhaps Mr. Christopherson and the Chamber of Commerce ought to focus on obtaining easement in those “blind” and forested stretches for bike trails winding through the trees near the road, and rejoining the separate bike trail alongside wherever possible. This would be the least impact, both visually, and it would be safest – and in the long run, probably less expensive. Better yet, of course, would be to have all off-road bike trails for non-motorized bikes. But as always, the big question is, who would maintain them, and how would we pay for this ongoing maintenance needed? Would a tourism tax help cover this? How would it be collected? Surely there are some state and private grants that may fit this need?
Orcas Island is NOT Lopez or San Juan or Shaw Island. It is a forested, hilly and mountainous island, and should remain so. The landscape here should get some respect and protection for what it IS- not be expected to transform into some kind of fantasyland theme park for bicycle tourists, or some other such demand.
Then there’s the issue of road etiquette: How often have we all been behind tourists on bikes, riding double or triple file, or stopped on a curve in the middle of a road, where a driver can’t pass. Some are downright arrogant – moving over onto the shoulder only if you honk your horn. Where is their etiquette and following rules of the road that we all must follow? Many of us workers carry tools and loads in our cars; we’re not out joyriding because it’s fun to drive around and waste gas.
Where are the promoters of bicycle tourism when it comes to paying for printing and distributing the educational materials the industry should be disseminating to tourists on bicycles? Will the Sheriff’s Dept give out tickets for violators on bicycles as well as those harried motorists trying to get around them? Where is the middle ground?
The bike and walking trails in Eastsound are also problematic, due to their many blind curves, and some folks speeding along on bikes oblivious to everyone else; it’s downright dangerous. I’m hoping that the Public Works road crew, who does the trail maintenance and does a great job keeping our trails walkable and ride-able, will rake up the English blackberry cuttings and holly leaves from the trails they maintain, or at least pile the brush off to the side of the trail, rather than leaving them on the trails to puncture bike tires. I pick those up while walking the trails, whenever I see them.
These are interesting comments and really serve to illustrate what cyclists and the bike culture of Orcas are up against. I can respond with these points:
1. The problem is neither the cyclists nor the motor vehicles. The problem is the County’s neglect in making the roads suitable for all users, including pedestrians. Our roads are an anachronistic leftover from the horse and buggy/Model “T” days of 100 years ago. The “character” they have is a dangerous one, not a “quaint” one!
2. Bicycles and pedestrians are not going to go away, they are going to increase. Count on it. The reasonable response is adapting to it and encouraging better infrastructure.
3. When riding on a roadway, a cyclist has all the rights and responsibilities of a vehicle driver (RCW 46.61.755)
4. The local bike shop is here because of the bicyclists, not the other way around. And no one is in the bicycle business to get rich. We like the bike and its contributions to non-polluting transportation, healthy lifestyle, and recreation.
Dan Christopherson: Of course you are right. But: People who make a living sending large groups of bicycles onto roads that are not safe for both vehicles and bicycles at the same time are creating conditions that are going to KILL someone. Do they – do you — realistically think that all vehicles are going to slow to bike speed for all those miles where passing is just not safe??? Not happening. Not safe. Promoters of bike tours on unsafe roads are responsible for reckless endangerment and so is the Chamber of Commerce that advertises Orcas as a bicycling destination.
Thea: You’ve written twice here about how cyclists shouldn’t use Orcas roads. If I’m right about “the problem is neither the cyclists nor the motor vehicles. The problem is the County’s neglect in making the roads suitable for all users”, then maybe it would be reasonable for you to write a letter or two to the County Council telling them that.
Hi Thea –
I’m not sure where you found information that indicates the Chamber of Commerce “advertises Orcas as a bicycling destination.” The staff at the Chamber’s Visitors Center regularly advises would-be bikers that our roads and topography make biking here very difficult (and not very fun for basic riders.) We suggest Lopez or San Juan as better alternatives. We also refer folks to Dan’s business in town for the details on riding on Orcas.
Our Visitor Guide includes this advisory:
Biking on Orcas Island
Orcas Island roads, with steep hills, blind curves, and sometimes little or no shoulder, are challenging for bike riders at every level of ability. Please use extreme caution when biking Orcas Island roadways.
OBSERVE THE FOLLOWING SIMPLE GUIDELINES:
After leaving the ferry, pull off the roadway until all ferry traffic has passed…
Travel single file in small groups of 3 or 4, widely spaced apart….
Stop only on straightaways and move completely off the road….
Use bicycle turnouts whenever possible.
Dan, I will disagree with you vehemently when you say that the problem is neither the cyclists nor the motor vehicles. And I do not believe that it is the duty of the county to make ALL roads suitable for ALL users. That would be very, very expensive and you don’t want to pay those taxes from your bicycle-related profits and I don’t want to pay those taxes from my retirement savings! There are plenty of places to safely ride a bicycle in this county… My question is when are people in the bicycle business, like yourself, going to make some/any effort to get bicyclists to obey the “rules of the road”…