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Get out in the backcountry and head out on an adventure.
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Welcome to the Throttle and Roast podcast. I'm your host, Niels The team at Backcountry Discovery Routes hasn't been sitting still and two new routes have been released in just the past couple of I'll share an overview of the BDR and the types of routes that they offer and also look at the two newest BDRs, the Lost Coast California and Montana BDR that should go live just before this episode is published. Finally, I'll look at some of the current routes so you can see if one of them is right for you. So let's start with what is BDR? if you think of just the simple acronym, Backcountry Discovery Routes, what this really is, is it's a nonprofit organization that's focused on creating off highway routes, targeting adventure and dual sport motorcycles. And they encourage economic impact in rural communities through which the routes pass and promote responsible motorcycle travel in the backcountry. They were founded back in 2010 and they've been producing a number of routes all across the United States. And most of these routes actually do have a Backcountry Discovery film highlighting a bit of BDR. So if you ever wanted to see what does the route entail, what are some of the sights and scenes that I might see, watching some of these films is a really phenomenal way to really get a feeling of what that experience could be In addition, the routes themselves are highlighted onto the website and you can download the GPS files for them for free.
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And this will also give you some tips on what they recommend that you should bring with where you might want to stay or refuel, et cetera, get food. All the other things that you have to think of when you're doing an extended travel routine. That's really what the BDR is doing. of how you can take your adventure or dual sport motorcycle and just put it out into the world and explore into the type of roads and travel routes that it really intrinsically has been designed for. And if you think of films like "Long Way Round" or even the Yala Habibi film that has just come out from Fort nine, getting around the globe and sometimes not being on pavement is part of the journey and part of the experience. And the BDR is really about fully embracing that concept.
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When we say BDR or backcountry discovery routes, really it started off with what today is usually referred to as a full BDR. And these are generally routes that are across a state or a region that typically travel from south to north and they use a combination of forest service roads, fire roads, two and other big bike friendly backcountry trails. Now, the routes will typically range from around 700 to 1400 miles and expected travel time is somewhere around five to eight days. And each section of that route is about 100 to 150 miles, which most riders can complete in a day. The sections tend to begin and end in an area with hotel and camping accommodations nearby, as well gas stations and So they've really organized it in such a way as to make it really easy for you to say, I'm going to target one section per day. I know I'm going to begin and end near some places where I can get some accommodations, whether you prefer camping, whether you prefer hotels, and there's obviously going to be some food and refilling options anywhere available at that location. These were the classic routes that the first few routes from the BDR organization created, and they reflect a great trip away from home. If you want to get out there and really explore the backcountry on your adventure motorcycle or even a dual sport, these are some phenomenal experiences. And you can take a long extended trip with The other format that they have come out with was starting back in 2022, and they created this new format called a BDR-X. Now, these are shorter routes than a full BDR, and they can often be completed in three to five days, making them a really great option for long weekends. Most of these routes tend to be a loop, and the beauty of that is it allows you to enter into the loop at any one of the starting points and finish off wherever you want. So some riders might even just do like one or two sections in a weekend and then return later to do a couple of the other sections. So breaking it up in this way where you're still always going to come back to where you started within the loop actually makes this a little bit more approachable for people who may not be able to take an extended vacation to do a full BDR. Now, the last type of route that you'll see for BDR is what they're calling BDR connector routes. And what they've done is because a lot of the routes that they've been building up in, building up in a lot of them tend to be out in the Western United States over time, as they're building out these routes, they kind of get fairly close to one another. And these little connector routes allow you to actually string together multiple BDRs into one contiguous experience. So if you have an extended period, maybe you've got a month of travel time that you can do, you could actually end up hitting three or four different BDRs with these various connector routes.
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I do want to cover a couple of the newest BDR routes that have come out just in the past couple of months. So the first one I'll start with is the Lost Coast, California, and it's a BDR X. This is a figure eight loop running about 500 miles along Northern California's kind of undeveloped coastline. So if you think of Northern California, most people will naturally just think you know, San Francisco, that whole area where Silicon Valley is. Well, there is a lot more to California than just that in Northern California. And if you go a little further north, the coastline tends to be relatively undeveloped. There's not a lot of large towns. And this route is really exploring that area. So it's something that is not really an area of California that a lot of people get to visit. And that to me is what makes this sort of intriguing. Now, this BDR X was launched in December of 2025, so relatively recently. it will have a combination of just endless switchbacks on both dirt and pavement. For example, in Section 4, you ascend the Bald Mountain along some of the switchbacks on that route. And it then continues into the Redwood National Park. So some just beautiful scenery that you will be able to enjoy. You're riding along a rugged coastline.
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going to see a number of historic coastline towns. Now, they do recommend, if you're going to partake of the Lost Coast, California, travel between late May to October. And the main reason for this is due to seasonal road closures that can happen in some of the wetter months. As the roads get, especially dirt roads, get a little bit more wet, they're going to turn into mud. It's going to become really difficult to pass through there, and especially if you're climbing up verticality with some mud-covered trails, it's going to be really hard to sort of navigate that. And one other thing that's really great about the BDR organization is that when they put together these routes, they give a recommended expertise level for each one of the routes, just to ensure that as you as a rider, you're going to feel comfortable to be able to accomplish them. Now, all of the routes are intended to be big bike Meaning they can accomplished on a large adventure motorcycle. So think of things like the KTM SuperAdventure 1390 or the BMW 1300 GSA. These are very large 600-pound bikes, and you could ride these routes on them.
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They're accomplishable. But the big thing is, what is the skill level of the rider? And what they tend to do is sort of say, hey, where are you in terms of your journey of becoming comfortable? It's not so much as a rider in general on pavement, but more in an adventure-style context, riding off-road. Now, for the Lost Coast California BDRX, they do say this is more of a lower-level intermediate rider. So... you know, think of, like, the early stages of becoming an intermediate off-road rider. So if you are a newer off-road rider, you might want to try some of the other routes first, versus the Lost Coast, California. Now the next one that I want to is the Montana Backcountry Discovery Route. this is the 23rd route due to launch on February 7th, 2026, or just a couple of days before this episode will be going live. Now, this is a full BDR, so expect at least a week for a typical journey across the entire route. It's going to be about a thousand miles across the state, crossing 13 different mountain ranges, and the preview film shows some of the variety of the route, and it promises to be another great BDR to add to your plan this summer. It's got some amazing views, beautiful scenery, just going across Montana, and it's really exciting to see this come in.
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Now, as I am recording this episode, of course, it is not live, so I have not seen the final route, I have not seen some of the other film stuff.
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That's going to be launching on February But I do love that the BDR organization continues to make these to become available for us. experience. And if you're maybe one of our listeners that is in Europe, this doesn't mean that you are excluded from being able to partake. You can always rent an adventure motorcycle in the United States, close to one of these route starts, and then ride the bike. Take it along its entire journey and then drop it off somewhere. There are a number of organizations that will help support you for that type of a journey, and it's a great way to have a really amazing experience.
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of course, I do want to cover a little bit of some of the other routes that the BDR organization has put together.
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As I said, the vast majority of the routes tend to be in the western part of the United States. the reason for this is it makes a lot of sense. If you think of the western states were pretty much the last ones to be settled when the United States was formed. So they don't have quite as much density of population. There is large stretches where there is preserved wilderness, especially a lot of national parks are part of that. So there are huge, huge areas of preservation out there.
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this allows for really much more of a backcountry experience in general. And because of that, there's a lot of BDRs that are out there. In fact, beyond the Lost Coast California BDRX that I just covered, there are actually two other California BDRs. They call them the North and the South BDR. And the Southern BDR is rated as being the most difficult BDR yet released by the BDR organization.
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They also have BDRs in Oregon, Arizona, Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, Nevada, Washington State, New Mexico and Idaho. So pretty much all of the western portion of the United States is covered.
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You've got the Continental Divide within there. You've got all of these mountain ranges. So there's a huge amount of elevation change that is part of these routes. if you are traveling through that area, you can really pretty much stitch any of these routes together.
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Now, as I alluded to, one of the challenges of the eastern part of the United States is because it was settled much earlier, the density of population tends to be much greater, and there are fewer backcountry areas. But it doesn't mean that we don't have any of these options. Now, one of the options that we do have here on the East Coast is the Mid-Atlantic backcountry discovery route. Now, I've ridden this one personally. This one I did a few years ago when I was at the BMW MOA rally in Virginia. So I just rode a little bit further south in Virginia the northern part of Tennessee and then started in Damascus, Virginia the next day It starts, as I said, just north of the Tennessee border in Damascus, Virginia and heads up into West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and finally it finishes right at the New York border south of Corning, New York, covering about 1,080 miles in total. Now, they do rate this one as a beginner plus route. So it is probably the easiest one of the BDR routes that are out there. I rode it completely solo.
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I had no other people that were riding with me. And to be honest, there was nothing that was really challenging about it. It was beautiful scenery, but there was nothing really technically challenging for the ride. But it was nice just to be out in the backcountry and enjoy the environment through which you traveled. The one reason why they call it a beginner plus is that with some bad weather, it can make some road conditions a little bit more challenging, but otherwise it is pretty much easy to navigate. Now another one that came in after the Mid-Atlantic BDR is the Southeast BDR. This covers about 1300 miles from the Gulf of Mexico and Florida across the Panhandle and into Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, North Carolina, and finally finishing in Damascus, Virginia, where it connects to the Mid-Atlantic BDR.
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So the beauty of this particular route is that if you wanted to start all the way from the furthest southern terminus of it in Florida, you could then ride all the way up to the New York border and connect these two BDRs together. They do suggest though that with some of the summer thunderstorms that are pretty common in that part of the United States that it can make the route a little bit more difficult with some slick mud and deep ruts, but they recommend late spring or September or October being the best month to take it on. It's a solid intermediate level route.
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So if you are a don't start with the Southeast BDR. If you are on the East Coast, I would actually say start with the Mid-Atlantic because it's pretty much a very easy route. Now the last route that we have here on the East Coast is the Northeast BDR. This is about 1,300 miles, and it makes the Northeast BDR one of the longest BDRs that are out there. It covers New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. So it's also one of the ones that covers the most states in a single BDR. Now there's so many small rural towns in the Northeast, that it really allows for some unique experiences as you travel through into these small little towns. All of these towns typically you'll find connected directly on these routes, and it is a wonderful way to experience some of the areas there.
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Now, this route is rated as an intermediate to an advanced, so it is one of the harder routes out there. So we have both the easiest one with the Mid-Atlantic BDR and one of the hardest with the Northeast BDR.
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Now, personally, I've ridden some sections of this route in the past, long before it actually got put together to be called a BDR. There's some sections of it from the puppy dog that happens throughout a lot of Vermont, some of the Transmass. So there are some elements that are previously generated routes that people did to have adventures along this area of the United States. But I've never gotten a chance to do the full Northeast BDR as it's now connected together. But I am hoping to be able to do that maybe sometime this summer So, let's wrap up, I covered a bit of background on the BDR organization, as well as a breakdown to some of the traditional BDRs, the newer BDR-X loop routes and some connectors for joining a couple of full BDRs together for an extended trip. I then covered a couple of the newest routes from the BDR organization, including the Lost Coast California BDRX, a 500 mile figure eight loop running through some of the coastline north of San Francisco. And I also touched on the newest full BDR in Montana, offering a thousand miles of breathtaking views. And finally, I touched on some of the other BDR options that are out there and have been around for a long time. Really, the West Coast is where you're going to find the vast majority of them. But here on the East Coast, we actually do have three different BDRs that are available to us. There are also some BDRXs that are in the middle of the country, and there's going to be even more BDRs coming in the future, including for some of our Canadian listeners. So my question for you is, is there a BDR or a BDRX that you are planning to ride this year?
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Share your thoughts through the text to show link in the show notes or leave a voicemail at throttle and roast dot com slash voicemail.
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Thanks for listening. I'll talk to you next week.
