Hey there. I'm back to my old blog site. I could never log on to the new one so I'm giving up.
I'm riding from Anacortes, WA to Minnesota. I'm being accompanied by my bride, Pam, Bill and Sandy Doyle and the infamous Gay Rehnback. I'll share with you their stories as we go along.
We just survived day 3. Barely.
Camping at the Virginian in Winthrope. Actually it's a rustic inn. Cedar walls with exposed beams in the ceiling. It's air conditioned and has a TV. The AC feels pretty good as I got my fair share of sun today. This place is our reward for the grueling climbing we endured today.
I think we gained about 5,700 feet in elevation when we reached Washington Pass in the North Cascades National Park. From our camp we climbed for about 25 miles. We coasted for a near equal distance! Winthrope is another 15 miles from the base of the climb.
The grade or steepness wasn't as bad as we feared. Map profiles are deceiving. Made it look vertical! Only felt that was for 30 or 40% of it. There were some steep pitches that would go for a mile or three. Kind of like stair steps.
As we climbed the scenery improved. Dramatically. Mountains with sharp precipices erupted thousands of feet in the cool air. Alpine glaciers dotted the surrounding landscape. I just wanted to stop and go make a snow angel. Maybe tomorrow. Or the next day. Or the next. We should be traveling through the Cascades for another 4 days.
We stopped pretty often. The obvious reasons would be food and water. Catching our collective breath from time to time is good too. But you probably don't know about, wait for it, butt fluffing! That's not a misprint. Our tushes get a tad sore as you can only imagine. So we stop and get off the bike and fluff our, butts! No one does it for you. Mostly we just get out of the saddle for a few minutes. No actual fluffing required.
The road shoulders are wide. Even so most drivers give us plenty of room. It's hard to go very straight when you're climbing with an 85 pound load (bike included), at 3-6 mph up hill. Speed is our friend when it comes to going straight. Please give cyclists the benefit of the doubt and give them 3+ feet. We have all kinds of stuff do dodge. I'll save that discussion for another post. The roads in WA have been great!
65 miles covered today
Day 2 we covered 56 miles. We broke camp at a state park. I was happy to leave too. We had to pitch our tents on gravel. Ugh. We have pads under our sleeping bags but it's not fun. Good showers though under the circumstances. $.50 gets you 3 minutes of water.
The road was pleasant. We meandered around route 20. Eventually that's the road we stay on for a long way. We traveled in a valley that got narrower and narrower. Only a few undulations in the road to give us a taste of things to come.
Day 1
A frantic morning at the Anacortes Inn. Get up. Grab a little continental breakfast then get the bike boxes and start re-assembling bikes! This whole process for my 2 bikes took about 3 hours. Fortunately I packed them so I knew what to do. In the boxes I also had several panniers (still to pack), sleeping bags, pads, tools, helmets and cycling shoes and more.
We finally departed around 11:30. Rode 6 miles to the ferry where the Northern Tier starts/ends. Then we doubled back to begin this journey anew.
We follow Adventure Cycling Association maps. The terrain was city/suburban with lots of waterways around. Scenic. Easy riding. Not much to report about this that I can recall 3 days later.
So it begins.
Rode 46 miles
After 3 days we have ridden 167 miles.
Thanks for reading! Cheers.
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