Today and the next couple days are forecast to be wicked hot, so I’m going to back off on the mileage. Today I did about 25 miles, much of it uphill, except the last mile was a steep descent. My total is now up to 252 miles. It really was a short but difficult day on the bike. I think I needed the short day after the last couple of long ones
I am going to have to climb back up the steep descent in the morning. At least I’ll be fresh. I’m at Maryhill State Park, right along the Columbia River.
The host at this campground gave me some firewood and says she will come back with a starter. She said she wishes she could be on an adventure like mine, but she now has MS and the best she can do is work as a campground host. I don’t know why, but I always have to hold back my emotions when strangers start talking llike that to me.
The route I am following at least until I get to Missoula Montana is the Louis and Clark Trail. It can be found on this website:
Last night I got restless so went on a 2 mile hike before calling it a day. There are a number of spectacular falls in the Columbia River Gorge.
This morning, it took me about 2 and 1/2 hours to make a simple breakfast, pack up the tent and everything else before I got moving.
Todays ride would have qualified as one of Dave H’s more difficult R2D2 prep rides. It turned hot and by the time I was done, I had covered 56 miles and 5200 vertical feet of climbing. This means I have now covered 226 miles. Today there was one steep climb where I got off twice and walked up two short steep sections. Lower gearing really would not helped much as I was going so slow, the loaded bike was getting hard to handle. It was much tougher than yesterday, but I’m clear through the Cascade Mountain Range. When I decided to go west to east, I knew I would start with some tough climbs, but I think that battling headwinds is worse, and at this latitude, the prevailing winds are from the west.
Today the winds were strong and from the west, which helped me some. At lunch, I enjoyed watching the kite surfers at Hood River. I talked to one fellow and he mentioned that the water had warmed up to about 50 degrees. That’s way too cold for a former Floridian like me.
The old Columbia Gorge road is now closed to cars in many places and has some great views. It even has a couple of tunnels for the pedestrians and cyclists. At one overlook, a couple riding e-bikes offered to take my picture. We talked a bit and they asked me if I was keeping a blog. I said yes and sent them the link.
Later, down the road was this stairs, with a place set up to run your bicycle tires on as you go up or down. There was one five mile section where the old road was closed and I had to ride on the shoulder of I-84. Actually, because of the wide shoulder, I felt slightly safer there than on route 30 west of Portland.
As I approached The Dalles, I gave up trying to reach a campground that was another 12 miles on and found a room at a Motel 6. I tried the Holiday Inn, but they wanted over $200 a night, which was too rich for my blood. It’s funny but I’m starting to realize that finding accommodations when traveling by bike is similar to traveling by car, except distances are a lot less. You can travel by car in one hour in what takes a whole day by bike.
Since I’m not real fond of restaurant food, I picked up a potato, a carrot, and an onion in order to make a soup for supper. Produce is one of the few things that you buy at the grocery store in quantities suitable for a single meal. I located a park with a picnic table on the River a mile or so away and went down and made my simple soup.
I had to try the golden fried asparagus last night. It was a bit on the greasy side, but still went down well.
Will this picture is for you.😀
Seventy one miles today along with a big climb near the end. Total miles about 170. I got going at six AM in part to avoid the traffic going into Portland. In Portland, one gal yelled something out of her car window at me. It sounded friendly but it took a few mental playbacks to realize that she said, “have an amazing adventure.”
The number of people living out of vehicles in and around Portland is tragic. The city has so much potential, but has a tough problem on its hand. It was well east of the town before I could find a nice park to eat lunch in.
East of the city, still on highway 30, the countryside transformed itself into a natural wonderland. The views of the Columbia River Gorge are spectacular. I loved riding this part of highway 30.
Near the top of todays biggest climb I found a roadside stand selling fruit. That pear hit the spot. It reminded me a bit of the peach stand at D2R2.
About 2:30 I found a hiker/biker campsite was available at Ainsworth State Park, even though it was Saturday night and the rest of the campsites were taken. The site comes with a place to lock you bike, an air pump and an assortment of tools.
Physically, I’m feeling pretty good. In the past, I’ve had this issue with getting severe cramps in my legs during the night after big efforts. Fortunately, the first night, I only had a minor issue, and no cramps at all last night.
The day started out on the wrong foot as I miscalculated my water supply. I’m carrying three water bottles, two on the frame and one in a rear pannier. The campsite was a primitive one, with no water, so I had to carry in all my water. When I arrived, I thought I had two full bottles, one on the frame for the evening and the one in the pannier for the morning. After a pretty good nights sleep, I started to prepare my breakfast when I realized the bottle in the pannier was used up the day before and I had no water at all. I packed everything up and went down the road to find water – it must have been before six and the temperature must have been about 50 so I wore my rain pants, a hat under my helmet and cold weather gloves. The fish hatchery a mile down the road had a bubbler in the lobby, but was closed until seven-thirty. Fortunately, a few more miles down the road I found a state park with water, picnic tables and even better, beautiful views. I made a fine breakfast of oatmeal and hot chocolate right there.
Late in the morning I had lunch along the river in Ranier, another nice spot.
At lunch time in Ranier, I searched, but couldn’t find a campground near Scapoose, where I figured I would end the day, except an RV park that didn’t accept tenters. I decided to reserve a motel room in St. Helena , about 20 miles down the road, but a little short of where I wanted to get. Between Ranier and St. Helen was a mix of quiet side roads and some more of the dreaded route 30. Here is a picture of Beaver Falls.
53.9 miles today, total of 99.4 miles. Tomorrow may be a long day, as I go through Portland for the final time.
it was a pretty long bus ride to Seaside, glad I decided not to ride it, mostly because I’d have to ride it again coming back east. I met two young fellows from the Netherlands on the bus. They were riding Oregon to Washington DC. There was also a fellow doing a month on the Oregon Coast trail. He said there was too much snow on the PCT this year.
Todays ride was about 45 miles. This is the area where Louis and Clark wintered, before returning east. Saw some sea lions and bald eagles. I stopped for groceries in Astoria. I got a portion of instant Mac and cheese for dinner. This was in homage to the book , “Miles from Nowhere”, where the author wrote about how much mac and cheese they ate when they first started touring. Hope to be more creative tomorrow regarding dinner. The last few miles included some time on a fairly busy highway- route 30 between Astoria and Portland, not fun. In contrast, the campsite is next to a small river, called Gnat Creek. The man from the next campsite over told all kinds of fish stories about catching loads of giant salmon out of there. He reminded me of my brother, Jerry. The woman was telling me about all the extreme bike rides that she had done – including doing Seattle to Portland in one day, which is over two hundred miles.
So much more to report, but I only have enough energy to report the highlights.
Last night I finally packed my bike into the large box that I got from the bike shop at REI. It was big enough that I was able to put all my stuff in the box with the bike.
My good friend, Paul picked me up at just before 4 AM in order to get me to the airport with my big box. First we tried to slide it into the back seat, but it was too long. Next we tried the bed of his pickup. It was so big that it didn’t fit in the bed of Paul’s truck too well, hanging over the top of the gate. Paul put a strap over it so it wouldn’t fly out of his truck onto the highway.
At the airport, the box with my bike and all my stuff only weighed in at 70 pounds, and I had to pay a 150$ overweight fee. I still think it’s better to have everything in one box rather than having to manipulate several bags and the large bike box. Given the extra weight of the box, I think I’m packing pretty light.
Ever since one of our customers at REI told that he was going to do a tour with only one pair of shoes, I thought that would do the same. During the tour of the northern Rockies that I did years ago, I brought two pairs of shoes, sneakers and cycling shoes. However cycling shoes during that time were unsuitable for much walking, something that has changed with the advent of SPD mountain shoes. I figured that I could always buy a new pair of running shoes, if the SPD shoes just didn’t cut it for walking.
However, last night I thought about it again, and changed my mind and decided to bring a pair of worn out running shoes. I figure that if I decide that the extra weight of the shoes isn’t worth the trouble, I can always toss them out.
Even though the box had a big hole in the side and the TSA went through it, everything arrived safely and I was able reassemble the bike with no issues
I even had time to take it for a spin and get fuel for the camp stove and a couple of other items. There are a lot of bike lanes here, also a lot of traffic and quite a few areas where destitute people have found places to camp.
Tomorrow, I decided I’m going to take a bus to Seaside and really get started on the adventure. I was originally going to ride down to the sea, but it’s several days ride, and then I would have to backtrack.
This image was taken many years ago during a trip through the Northern Rocky Mountains. We had three straight days of rain and temperatures in the 40s, colder at night, but the proper gear kept me warm and mostly dry. I’ll be using the same bike and panniers on this trip. However, the rain gear which includes booties, gloves, jacket and pants have all been replaced over the past several years. The weather was so foul during those three days of rain that the drivers of random cars would stop and ask us if wanted a ride, which we would refuse. I will not not be so far north during my upcoming trans-america tour, but decided to bring along the equivalent amount of foul weather gear, which I can always mail home, if I decide it is not necessary.
The funny thing about current model touring/adventure bikes, is that they weight the same or more than my old Trek 520 and are more complicated and finicky. I think the weight factor is partly because of the move to gravel riding, which requires a more robust bike and heavier racks. My upcoming tour will be primarily on pavement. The finicky part is due to the more advanced disc brakes and indexed shifters which require more precise adjustment for proper operation. When properly adjusted, the newer stuff definitely works far better than the older style components, but the new stuff is also more delicate and complicated.
Last week I had an annual physical with my primary care physician, Doctor Ragucci. Doctor Ragucci hosts residents from Tufts University and the physical started with a nice couple of young doctors going over my medical history and examining me. After they went over me, Doctor Ragucci came in and repeated the exam.
By the end of the physical, the doctors were all complimenting me on how well I was taking care of myself. Towards the end of the physical, I told them that I was taking care of myself because I was afraid of what would happen if I didn’t. Doctor Ragucci said more people should be afraid.
Ten years ago I knew my body wasn’t handling my sedentary life and excess weight very well. I weighed about 70 more pounds than I do now. I could only jog about 100 yards before I’d have to slow down and walk. Since those days, I have worked out religiously, lost weight and improved my diet. So many physical things that were troubling me have become mere memories. A few weeks ago I jogged 9.4 miles first thing in the morning and then did the rest of normal work day routine.
As I was running past a neighbor a year or so ago, he said to me. “You are going to live forever.” I responded, “It’s not how long you live, but how well you live.”
It’s hard to live well, if you body isn’t in great shape. Or put another way, if you don’t have your health, nothing else matters.
I chose to ride my bike to work the other day. The ride into work was very nice. However it started raining about 30 minutes before the end of my shift. The ride home was cold and wet. It was a good thing I did this, as I decided I needed to bring a bit more foul weather gear on my upcoming adventure.
With less than two weeks to go, I have had to solve a few automobile issues here at home. Last Saturday, Cristy’s nice 2016 Malibu was totaled by a driver that pulled out from a side street directly into my path while I was trying to get to work . Unfortunately, I was not quite able to avoid the offending car and it turned out that he took out the entire right side of the Malibu. At least no one was hurt, though some pedestrians on the sidewalk were pretty frightened.
Malibu
I was driving Cristy’s car because our other two cars had mechanical issues. My Mustang died on me the day beforehand. It turns out that the alternator had failed. I have since fixed that problem. Our Caravan, was somewhat drivable, but had a bad wheel bearing. My mechanic fixed that yesterday. Anyway all car issues have occurred while I was trying to focus on preparing for my bike trip.
Speaking of the bike trip, there are a couple of things left to be done including finding someone to mow the lawn. That appears to be more challenging that I expected. Many lawn services are not taking new work, and others want a season long contract.
I”m also contemplating what to bring. I know that as I travel, I will purchase stuff that I need, but didn’t bring and I may well send stuff home that I don’t really need.
I’ve been contemplating whether to grow a beard or attempt to shave daily. The problem with shaving is the weight of an electric shaver and charger. I’m not able shave with a regular blade without hacking up my tender face, so that Isn’t an option.
I found an old planning spreadsheet from my last big bike journey, a trip from Missoula, Montana to Jasper, Alberta. It lists everything I was considering bringing on that trip. I will use it as a starting point for finalizing this years list, though some things have changed. No camera on this trip, as modern phones make excellent cameras, but I will need to bring a charger and I’ll probably also bring an external battery. This trip doesn’t involve such northerly latitudes as that last trip, so I will omit the booties and maybe the warm gloves and possibly an extra layer of clothing.
