There’s a savanna on top of a ridge outside of The Dalles, and everything the light touches is your kingdom.

Ketchum rides along an improbably flat-topped ridge with the greater Mosier Creek watershed on one side and Mill Creek on the other side—which makes for some great views. It maintains a positively reasonable gradient for its length compared to some of the roads nearby.

An absolute gem in a hidden valley, Dry Creek climbs from Mosier to the top of 7 Mile Hill at a perfect gradient, with wide-open views of the Dry Creek hollow below. There’s gravel, there’s grass, there’s orchards, there’s stands of scraggly trees. It’s another perfect road outside The Dalles!

Dry Creek is the best way to start a ride from Mosier that connects to the many other perfect roads of the Dalles or to get to the top of 7 Mile Hill.

One day I’ll talk to a local historian about the names of all these roads, but for now I’ll speculate that this road went to someone’s ranch by the name of Robert or Roberts.

This road is long-known by gravel aficionados for its early miles in the grueling Oregon Stampede Route, including the iconic abandoned schoolhouse known as the “Grammers’ School” (because everyone puts it on Instagram) and the route’s first interminable climb up to Center Ridge. [LINK]

This road used to get a steady stream of cyclists coming through once a year during the Oregon Stampede, but it’s mostly quiet the rest of the time. It’s the most direct route from Dufur to Center Ridge — a crushed gravel grind up a steady 6% climb. 

I met one of my best riding buddies climbing up this road one year. Another year, on a particularly hot day, a group of us had to stop 2/3 up the hill and lay in a tiny sliver of shade cast by a low shrub. It’s also great as a downhill, although it never left any indelible memories.

Short but mighty, State Road offers smooth sailing back toward the Dalles after the white-knuckle descent down Hastings Ridge. This road gives you a short glimpse of what could have been if Fifteenmile Road continued the length of its namesake creek all the way to Dufur.