A Morning on the Centennial Trail
When Priya from our BugBitten team rolled up to the Riverfront Park trailhead at half past seven on a Tuesday in late September, she wasn't entirely sure what to expect from a paved urban trail in a mid-sized American city. She'd spent the previous week grinding through the hills of eastern Washington on rougher country roads, legs heavy and enthusiasm for climbing temporarily on hiatus. The Centennial Trail had been recommended as a recovery ride — something flat, easy, and forgiving. What she didn't anticipate was how thoroughly it would win her over.
The morning air coming off the Spokane River was sharp and cool, carrying the faint smell of cottonwood leaves already beginning to turn. A pair of cyclists in full kit overtook her quietly near the first bridge, and a bloke walking a large, unruly dog gave her a wave from the opposite bank path. Within ten minutes she'd stopped three times — once for the falls, once for a great blue heron standing dead-still on a rock midstream, and once just to take in the fact that she was riding a smooth, traffic-free path through the centre of a city and feeling, improbably, like she was somewhere quite remote. That mix — urban convenience and genuine natural character — is what the Centennial Trail does better than almost any urban trail Priya had ridden in the Pacific Northwest.
What Makes This Trail Worth Your Time
Thirty-seven kilometres of smooth asphalt following a river corridor from Nine Mile Falls in the west all the way to the Idaho state border in the east — on paper it sounds modest, and in terms of difficulty it absolutely is. But modest doesn't mean uninteresting, and easy doesn't mean forgettable. The Centennial Trail earns its place on this list not through dramatic elevation gain or technical challenge, but through consistent quality, genuine scenery, and the kind of practical accessibility that makes it useful to an unusually wide range of travellers.
The trail is a separated shared-use path for virtually its entire length. That means you're riding, walking, or rolling along a dedicated surface with no cars to worry about, no anxious glances over your shoulder at passing trucks, and no need to claim a lane you're not sure you're entitled to. For anyone who finds road cycling in unfamiliar cities stressful, this is a meaningful benefit. You can actually look at where you are rather than where the next vehicle is coming from.
The surface stays in solid condition across most of the route. There are a few cracked and patched sections in the older industrial stretches towards the western end, but nothing that would cause grief on a standard hybrid or road tyre. The gradient is flat to gently rolling — the kind of terrain where a person of average fitness can cover the full out-and-back in a comfortable single day without feeling destroyed at the turnaround point.
What genuinely separates the Centennial Trail from other urban paved paths is the quality of the natural corridor it runs through. The Spokane River is a proper river — fast-moving, rocky, alive with birds — and for most of the trail's length you're riding alongside it or above it, close enough to hear the water. That proximity to moving water changes the character of an urban ride more than you might expect.
How the Area Actually Feels
Spokane tends to get overlooked in conversations about the Pacific Northwest, overshadowed by Seattle to the west and the outdoor recreation reputation of Boise and Bend to the south. That relative low profile works in its favour for travellers who prefer a city that hasn't been polished to a frictionless tourist sheen. The downtown core is genuinely liveable rather than performatively charming — there are good coffee shops, a solid farmers market in season, independent bookshops, and a food scene that has improved noticeably over the past decade without becoming self-congratulatory about it.
The North Bank district, which the trail passes through just north of downtown, has a relaxed, neighbourhood feel. It's the kind of place where you can lock up a bike, get a decent flat white, and sit outside for twenty minutes without anyone trying to sell you anything or hurrying you along. The university area to the south has the energy you'd expect — young, slightly chaotic, cheap food options — while the stretches further east and west of the city centre grow quieter and more residential.
Along the trail itself, the atmosphere shifts depending on the time of day and where you are. Early mornings near the falls are genuinely peaceful; by mid-morning on a weekend, the Riverfront Park section fills up with a mix of families, runners, dog walkers, and the occasional touring cyclist loaded with panniers who looks slightly bewildered to find themselves sharing a path with a child on a balance bike. It never feels overcrowded in the way that, say, a popular coastal trail might in high summer, but it's not solitary either.
The cottonwood groves that line the river corridor are worth mentioning separately. In autumn — roughly mid-September through October — they turn a sharp, vivid gold that makes even the urban sections feel unexpectedly beautiful. If you're timing a trip to the Pacific Northwest for autumn colour, Spokane's river corridor is a genuinely compelling reason to route through the city.
What to Actually Do Here
Ride the Full Length
The obvious choice is to ride the full thirty-seven kilometres end to end, or to do an out-and-back covering as much of it as appeals. Starting from the Riverfront Park area in the city centre gives you immediate access to the most dramatic section of the trail — the stretch past the Spokane Falls, where the river drops through a series of rocky chutes and the sound alone is worth stopping for. Going west from here takes you through the older industrial corridor and eventually to Nine Mile Falls and the reservoir beyond it, a stretch that's quieter and less visited than the city sections. Going east takes you through progressively quieter residential and parkland areas, eventually crossing into Idaho.
Slow Down at the Falls
Priya's biggest piece of advice after riding the trail is to budget time at the falls. It's easy to treat them as a thing you pass on the way to somewhere else, but the view from the lower path — where the water is close enough to feel the spray on a high-flow day — is genuinely arresting. The old rail bridges overhead add an industrial-historical layer that contrasts interestingly with the raw geology of the falls themselves.
Bird the Corridor
The Spokane River corridor is productive bird habitat. Great blue herons are almost guaranteed; ospreys hunt the river through summer; American dippers work the rocky shallows year-round. If you're travelling with binoculars, the quieter sections west of the city and around the Nine Mile Reservoir are worth particular attention. For travellers who also have an interest in wildlife refuges, the Klamath Basin NWR Complex further south is worth building into a broader Pacific Northwest itinerary.
Use It as a Warm-Up or Rest Day
The trail works well as a zero-pressure day in the middle of harder touring. If you've come off something demanding — the mountains east of the Cascades, say, or a section of the Southern Tier Route — a day on flat pavement alongside a river is genuinely restorative without making you feel like you've wasted a day.
When to Go (and When Not To)
Late May through September is the reliable window. June and July give you the longest days and generally stable weather, though temperatures in Spokane can reach the mid-thirties Celsius on peak summer afternoons, which makes an exposed riverside trail less comfortable than it sounds. Early morning starts solve this problem almost entirely — the canyon effect of the river corridor keeps temperatures lower in the morning hours, and the light on the water in the first couple of hours after sunrise is genuinely worth the early alarm.
Late September through mid-October is arguably the single best time to ride the trail if you can manage it. The summer crowds thin out, temperatures drop to a very comfortable riding range (typically high teens to low twenties Celsius), and the cottonwood colour is at its peak. The light in autumn at this latitude has a quality that photographers tend to get evangelical about, and for once the evangelism is justified.
Winter is possible on mild days but genuinely not recommended unless you know Spokane's weather patterns well. The city sits in a rain shadow of sorts, so it gets less precipitation than western Washington, but temperatures drop below freezing regularly from November through February, and the trail surface can be icy without warning. Spring — April through mid-May — is hit and miss, with some beautiful days punctuated by cold rain and the occasional late frost.
Avoid major summer holiday weekends if you dislike crowds. The Fourth of July period and Labour Day weekend bring significant numbers of local users to the trail, particularly the Riverfront Park section.
How to Get There and Nearby Stops
Spokane is served by Spokane International Airport (GEG), which has direct connections to Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Denver, and several other US hubs. Amtrak's Empire Builder line — the Chicago to Seattle route — stops in downtown Spokane, making it accessible by train if you're travelling from the east or coming from Seattle.
The trail is best accessed by bicycle, and bike hire is available from several outfitters in downtown Spokane. If you're touring with your own bike, the Riverfront Park area has multiple obvious access points. Parking is available near the park if you're driving, though on weekends the closest lots fill up by mid-morning.
For broader trip planning around the city, the BugBitten guide to more places in Spokane covers accommodation and additional activity options. Accommodation in the city runs from budget motels near Gonzaga University to mid-range chain hotels downtown, with a small number of more characterful independent options in the North Bank area. Expect to pay around USD $90–150 per night for a decent mid-range room; prices spike during university events and the annual Bloomsday road race in May.
Nearby stops worth building into a longer trip include Riverside State Park, which sits just west of the Nine Mile Falls end of the trail and has good hiking on rougher terrain above the river, and the Palouse region to the south, which offers some of the most distinctive agricultural landscapes in the Pacific Northwest.
For travellers interested in heritage sites and natural landmarks across the broader region, the UNESCO World Heritage Centre maintains useful context on significant sites across North America, and the full UNESCO World Heritage List is worth a browse when planning a longer Pacific Northwest itinerary that takes in sites of exceptional natural or cultural value.
The Not-So-Good Bits
In the interest of honest reporting, a few things worth knowing before you go.
The western end of the trail, from roughly the industrial stretches out towards Nine Mile Falls, is the least well-maintained section. Surface cracking and patching is more frequent here, and some of the infrastructure (signage, rest facilities) is noticeably less polished than the city-centre sections. It's still rideable, but manage expectations accordingly.
The Riverfront Park section can feel congested on weekend mornings, particularly when events are on in the park. The shared-use nature of the path — cyclists, runners, walkers, dogs, families with pushchairs — works well most of the time, but when numbers increase, the path isn't wide enough for everyone to feel entirely comfortable. Going early on weekends addresses this almost entirely.
Facilities thin out significantly west of the city centre. If you're heading towards Nine Mile Falls, carry water and food, because the cafes and services available in the North Bank area don't have equivalents further west. The eastern section towards Idaho is better served with occasional parks and rest spots.
Wind is worth taking seriously. The river corridor channels afternoon breezes with impressive efficiency, and a headwind on the return leg of an out-and-back can make the last ten kilometres feel considerably harder than the outward journey suggested they would. A wind layer is always worth having in the bag.
Final Word from the BugBitten Team
The Centennial Trail isn't the most dramatic ride in the Pacific Northwest — it doesn't pretend to be, and that honesty is part of what makes it work. What it offers is something different: a long, accessible, well-considered piece of trail infrastructure that puts you in genuine contact with a river, a city, and a landscape that deserves more attention than it typically receives.
For families, it's close to ideal. For touring cyclists wanting a rest day with scenery rather than a rest day staring at the ceiling, it's hard to beat. For anyone passing through Spokane who wants to understand the city better than a hotel room and a restaurant will show them, three hours on this trail will do more than almost any other single activity. The falls alone are worth the detour. The autumn cottonwoods will stop you in your tracks.
Priya came back to Spokane the following year, specifically to ride it again in October. That's probably the most honest endorsement we can offer.