This steep, deep, and rugged backcountry ride is one of the hidden gems of Washington’s Gifford Pinchot National Forest, and Orogenesis as a whole. For the past three years Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance has been teaming up with the Orogenesis Collective to tackle the massive restoration project, and last summer we drove the figurative ‘golden spike’ making it (mostly) rideable from end to end. 

What is Orogenesis? Orogenesis (pronounced oro-genesis) is an ambitious bikepacking project born out of Bikepacking Roots with the goal of creating a contiguous singletrack route from Canada to Cabo. Yes, just like the Pacific Crest Trail, but with a focus on backcountry mountain biking. The Klickitat Sisters Trail traverses a steep ridgeline at approximately 5,000’ overlooking the Cowlitz River Valley to the north. It’s a key connector along the 200 mile Loowit Tier from Packwood to White Salmon—a section of the route launching later this spring—and farther south to the Oregon Timber Trail. 

Much of the non-wilderness trail system in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest allows motorized use, which can be fun to ride but we knew we had to seek out the few non-motorized trails for Orogenesis connectivity. A few like Strawberry Ridge, Ape Canyon, and Lewis River were classic backcountry rides that saw enough traffic to keep them mostly open, but this ridgeline trail in the far north of the forest had very little info anywhere we looked, and an intimidating elevation profile to boot. The more we dug, the more we were certain that we needed to include this trail on the route, and our first visit in 2019 confirmed that. 

The Klickitat Sisters Trail has been used for at least several thousand years by the people who call this area home. The Cowlitz people lived in the valley below and accessed high country ridges like this during the summer for a bounty of resources like huckleberries, wild game, and weaving materials. Neighboring tribes, like the Klickitat to the southeast, would make the journey over the shoulder of Pahto (Mt Adams) and along the ridgeline to trade with the Cowlitz. Any more information about the Klickitat Sisters Trail is hard to come by. 

Who were the Klickitat Sisters? We may never know due to the erasure of indigenous history through introduced diseases, war, and intentional cultural erasure through the boarding school system: "systematic militarized and identity-alteration methodologies to attempt to assimilate American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian children through education." These methodologies included renaming children with English names, cutting their hair, preventing the use of their native language and prohibiting the practice of their religions and cultural practices. (1)

This past summer we wrapped up our third year of stewardship on this trail, which has invariably deepened our relationship and respect for this place. We’ve collectively poured 1,156 hours of volunteer time into this trail and we couldn’t be more proud of, and thankful for, the dozens of volunteers who’ve traveled from far and wide to lend a hand. 

In year one we held our first-ever stewardship event at Jackpot Lake, and amusingly were stymied by deep snow drifts in mid July. But we persevered and logged out much of the trail to the west of Jackpot Lake, and east to the Siwash Saddle. This event drove home why the trail was in such sorry shape—it’s steep, deep, and rugged country. At 17 miles long the Klickitat Sisters Trail is the longest non-wilderness trail that’s not bisected by a road in the whole Gifford Pinchot NF. This makes it extra special, but also extra hard to lug a chainsaw into the middle of it.

For our second year we focused on opening a couple access points that trail crews have used in the past—Siwash and Mission Mountain—making our job much easier in the future, as well as allowing for more loop options when riding. 

Last summer in our third year we tackled the middle miles on either side of St John Lake, culminating in one of the hardest days of trail work we’ve experienced. It also wins the “most mosquitos” award. (a tube of benadryl) 

All this is to say that our volunteers rock. After that particularly hard day in July we asked the crew “How can we make these events easier when the trail is so hard”, and bless their hearts they just smiled and said “We keep coming back because it’s hard.” 

Orogenesis was perhaps the instigator for the restoration of this historic trail, but Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance was the enabler. The Cowlitz-Naches chapter holds the volunteer service agreement that enables our work, and their sawyer program has provided us with nearly all our trained chainsaw operators. We’re proud to be working together on this project, and especially proud to say “Come ride the Klickitat Sisters Trail in 2025!” But maybe pack a handsaw—it’s still a little rough around the edges. 

Stay tuned for more on this partnership, and collaborations with other area organizations to build more trails and enhance connectivity in the Cowlitz Valley. We’ve got some really exciting things in the works to solve one of the most complex gaps in the whole 5,000 miles of Orogenesis.