By Aaron Theisen
Cover photo courtesy of Aaron Theisen
With nearly a dozen bike parks within a half-day’s drive, Spokane has quietly become a hub for mountain bikers looking to life list some of North America’s premier gravity-riding destinations. But for all the accolades accumulated by the region’s lift- and shuttle-serviced bike parks, the vibe remains refreshingly relaxed and approachable; first-timers and freeride experts alike will be wearing smiles under their full-face helmets.
Silver Mountain Bike Park
Kellogg, Idaho
A tech-riding testing ground, Silver Mountain Bike Park boasts 3,500 vertical feet of rotor-smoking, rock-smashing DH trails, accessed via North America’s longest gondola. A top-to-bottom run will leave your hands stuck to the grips and a smile plastered to your face. Chair 3 offers shorter, but no less feature-packed runs, including the sidehill roots of Snake Pit and Franknbeans. With over 35 trails, there’s plenty for the beginner and intermediate rider, from the cruisy Pay Day to the crowd-favorite roots and jumps of Jackass.
Schweitzer Bike Park
Sandpoint, Idaho
In recent years, Schweitzer has vastly expanded its venerable bike park, augmenting the resort’s notoriously knotty tech trails such as Pinch Flat and Redemption with new-school jump lines like Shake n Bake and Butterstuff that pack berms and booters onto the beargrass slopes. Meanwhile, Shenanigans and its side-quest singletrack option Zig Zag expertly blend both, with machine-built jumps and natural rock rolls and drops. And nearly all the park’s trails feature views of Lake Pend Oreille that will thrill any skill level of rider. Bonus: The trailside huckleberry picking at Schweitzer rivals anywhere in the region.
Panhandle Bike Ranch
Sagle, Idaho
The region’s newest bike park, Panhandle Bike Ranch opened in 2025 as a nonprofit, with an innovative donation-based model and an aim to enhance community biking opportunities. The truck-shuttled ranch has certainly filled a gap in the Panhandle’s inventory of freeride trails: the small footprint—10 trails, although more open this year—belies the big jump lines of black-diamond B90, but also the opportunities for skills progression. The no-fear flow of First Rodeo and the intermediate rollers of Darlin’ will have groms and their grandparents ripping in no time.
Whitefish Mountain Resort
Whitefish, Montana
The pedal pedigree at Whitefish stretches back decades (long-time riders will remember when it was “Big Mountain Bike Park”). But the classic rock theme at Whitefish Mountain Resort doesn’t mean these trails are dinosaurs. Kashmir, one of the grandaddies of gravity-fed flow in the region, jams down a series of tabletops and big berms. Meanwhile, Runaway Train remains a favorite on the regional DH race circuit for its drops and rock gardens. Like any good classic rock station, Whitefish plays the (big) hits. And they’re hits for good reason.
Legacy Bike Park
Lakeside, Montana
Legacy Bike Park, on the west shore of Montana’s Flathead Lake, has quickly built itself a national reputation for big, Instagrammable jumps. But the builders of Legacy’s trails, Whitefish-based Terra Flow Trails (which also constructed its namesake trail at Schweitzer), understand that riders need a place to progress to those pro lines. Legacy’s emphasis is progression: Rack up experience on rollers and banked turns on the berm-filled Bluetiful, then take those same skills to the progressively larger hits of Onyx. Come on a Friday, camp alongside families of rippers in the park’s campground, and you’ll go home Sunday evening a better rider.
RED Mountain Bike Park
Rossland, BC
The Mountain Bike Capital of Canada, better known for technical XC and steep freeride trails, Rossland had few opportunities for flow, and none for lift-served shredding. Until RED. The bike park at RED Mountain Resort, which flirted with lift-accessed riding over a decade ago, began loading bikes once again in 2025. The new bike park incorporates beloved trails originally built by the Kootenay Columbia Trails Society with new, purpose-built lines. Lapis (Lazuli), an intermediate flow trail, has quickly become a crowd favorite—the wide, high-speed track stacks non-stop tabletops, all of them rollable. It’s one of the premier jump trails in the West Kootenays, and it burnishes Rossland’s reputation as a dirt destination.
Big White Bike Park
Kelowna, BC
Topping out at just over 7,000 feet, the highest-elevation bike park in the region serves up big hits alongside big views amongst the open alpine meadows above Kelowna and Okanagan Lake. One lap on the wheel-pinging pinball alley of Rock Hammer and riders will know: Okanagan rock hits different. With all that granite, it’s even more impressive that Big White has carved out a niche for high-speed flow trails. Pry Bar, so named for the rock-moving magic used in its construction, unspools big, beginner-friendly berms and rollers. Dark Roast’s doubles will have expert riders returning for refills.
SilverStar Bike Park
Vernon, BC
SilverStar celebrated its 30th year of operation in 2024, marking its heritage as one of the world’s first lift-served bike parks, but it has remained at the forefront of trail design, with new trails like Chien Chaud (French for “Hot Dog”) deftly mixing tech and flow into one well-rounded ride. The secret is consistency: a beginner rider can carry over the skills from the easy rolls of Challenger to the tabletops of Jedi Mind Tricks and Super Star, yet experts can have as much fun on those as the pro-level Walk the Line and Title Line. SilverStar’s expertly manicured berms—some of the best around—will convert even the staunchest tech-trail partisan.
Fernie Alpine Resort Bike Park
Fernie, BC
No bike park better reflects its surrounding community than Fernie Alpine Resort. The resort just outside this East Kootenays mountain town feels like an extension of the raw, root-strewn singletrack of the expansive local trail network. But at FAR, riders can experience real Fernie riding with the ease of chairlifts, which is especially refreshing in a town where the climbs don’t come easily. From the skinnies and stunts of Playground to the lower-angle loamers of Aggravated Assault and the fall-line steeps and stunts of Timber Chair icons TNT and Rumplestumpskin, the highlights here are hand-built tech. But Fernie’s builders have shown that they know flow too: the newly reimagined Eville is one of the best green flow trails in the region.
Stevens Pass Bike Park
Leavenworth, Washington
The smallest bike park in the region, Stevens Pass Bike Park boasts outsize gravity thrills on its nine trails, all under the alpine vistas of the Central Cascades. Intermediate riders looking for flow will repeat the rollable tabletops of Rock Crusher, while tech-trail experts can tackle the roots and slabs of Slingshot Wookie. And although the fall-line chunder of Berserker has made a name for itself on the regional DH race circuit, beginners have plenty to keep them loading the chairlift, with both Golden Spike and Morooka Motion stringing together low-stakes, high-fives fun.
Loup Loup
Twisp, Washington
Although riders here will have to get to the top under their own power, Loup Loup Ski Bowl, east of Twisp in Washington’s North Cascades, emphasizes the possibilities for summer speed at small ski hills. The Methow chapter of the Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance worked with the U.S. Forest Service and the Loup Loup Ski Educational Foundation, the nonprofit that manages the ski hill, to develop a plan for 40 miles of singletrack on the loamy larch-forested slopes and long granite slabs of the east slope of the Cascades, which ties into a broader backcountry system of historic trails. So far, Evergreen and its partners have built out 16 miles of trail, including the intermediate Oso Peligroso, which serves up small slab features and side-hits under some of the most dramatic mountain backdrops in the country.
Aaron Theisen is an accomplished outdoors writer and photographer who calls Spokane home when he isn’t out traveling around North America on assignment. He’s a long-time Out There contributor, and his work has appeared in many regional and national publications and destination marketing materials throughout BC and the U.S.
