Glacier National Park, to the bitter end

Aside from the physical process of riding a bike, of moving through this world and the world moving around you in response, the endless opportunity for discovery, solitude, companionship, self-discovery, challenge, and pretty much everything that happened between the start and the finish of this trip, the purpose was to visit my sister, Amy, in Glacier Park before she finished her summer-long indentured servitude. For the mere pittance of a dank and cramped room to stay and an equally meager wage, she has spent the last four months giving her soul to the thankless world of food service, all for the ever-present but ever-elusive promise of adventure that beckons just outside the door of the almost nonexistent town of St Mary, Montana. As fortune would have it, however, I stood to benefit directly from her sacrifices, by way of a free place to sleep, shower, and shit, and even the possibility of pilfered kitchen goods, to boot. Now I like to think that I am gracious and polite in my acceptance of hospitality, and am sensitive enough to never wear out my welcome, but this, this was different. This is my sister. This is family. There are no welcomes to wear out, so, far from stepping on eggshells, I took the opportunity to stomp around the place with muddy cleats.

By a meticulous amount of laborious planning on both sides, the day after my arrival was auspiciously marked by the return of Shannan, coming in to Glacier by train. By that time, she had managed a couple of weeks of rest and recovery for her knees, and though she wasn't able to continue biking past Victoria, there was little reason for her to miss the grandeur that northwestern Montana has to offer.

And Oh! The Grandeur! Glacier National Park stands as the proud centerpiece of a protected wilderness area sprawling more than 16,000 square miles, collectively known as the Crown of the Continent. Glaciers carve the landscape into knife-edged peaks and scoured valleys, leaving behind a pristine wilderness teeming with impressive megafauna; virtually all species of life which were found when European settlers first passed through the area can still be found today. It is no great exaggeration to say that Glacier Park currently holds the distinction of my favourite place I've ever been (I've visited the park numerous times, living in Missoula as a child, visiting family in my adolescence, and returning as an adult). Though I'd hiked around a respectable amount before, this trip marked my first opportunity to get off the more beaten paths and backpack into the more remote back country which makes up the vast majority of the park, and is only accessible by foot. (Shannan and I had mailed our backpacks ahead to ourselves.)

Glaciers, sheer cliff faces, scree piles, billion-year-old rock formations, stromatolites and fossils, passes, peaks, valleys, forests, tundra, lakes, rivers, all were ripe for exploration.

Wild Goose Island on St Mary Lake.

Elizabeth Lake Valley.

Unfortunately, Glacier only has two seasons: winter, and something that a little less resembles winter. We were timing our visit with the end of the tourist season, arriving at the end of Labour Day weekend; though this drastically decreased the number of people in the park, it had us constantly gambling with the weather, and there were many, many days where we got rained, hailed, or snowed out. Though we came prepared to spend a solid week or two backpacking, we ended up spending the majority of our time going out on long day hikes, and returning back to Amy's place for the night to dry out. The weather was kind enough to let us get a good three-day hike in, but other than that, it proved to be mostly little fits and bursts into the park, rather than the luxurious forays we had envisioned.

Backpacking over Ptarmigan Pass.

No matter the situation, no matter the weather, no matter the duration, we were constantly inundated with the sensational wildlife that surely everyone hopes to glimpse at least once. Mama and baby grizzly bears fed on berries in startlingly close (but safe!) bushes nearby, black bears crossed our paths in search of food, herds of bighorn sheep surrounded our car to lick it clean of salt, and families of moose tromped along the hiking trails just a stone's throw ahead of us. The most sensational sighting of this trip happened not in Glacier, surprisingly, but in the Rattlesnake Wilderness Area just outside of Missoula (we drove down and spent a few days in Missoula for Amy's birthday), where we startled a full-grown mountain lion that was nosing around the banks of a creek. Though they are comparatively common to many other animals I've seen in the wild, sightings of them are intensely scarce due to their secretive and crepuscular demeanour; generally, if you see one, it's only because you're in trouble, i.e., being stalked. It astonishes me, even now as I write this, that such a large animal can be so ubiquitous and simultaneously so well-hidden.

Bighorn sheep ewes out for the "hunt".

I expected to help cover my food expenses while I was there by lending a hand in Amy's restaurant, but they proved to be more than sufficiently staffed. Baulking at the idea of paying for two persons' worth of restaurant fare for every meal for such a long period of time, we ended up working out a system with my sister and much of the rest of the wait staff, whereby they would collect the remains of whatever didn't get eaten by the customers, and this arrangement largely sufficed for the two weeks we were there. Though occasional meals would come up with nothing, more often than not an entire burrito or salmon fillet or salad would make its way onto our plates.

Fishing for a meal in St Mary Lake.

As snow ushered me into the park, so did it usher me out. On our last full day there, the skies let loose the first real snow of the coming winter, and a good eight inches covered Logan Pass, the very pass we needed to cross in order to get to the train station to go home. The plows worked assiduously, though, and we made it through in time to cash in on our tickets home. Though we didn't know this in advance, we ended up scheduling our train the day before the pass closed for the rest of the season, so we barely got out by the skin of our teeth.

Logan Pass, before the storm.

True to form, we made it home, peacefully and predictably. I'm currently up in Seattle for a few days right now, picking up Shannan's bike and visiting some friends, but I'll be back in Eugene to stay soon enough. I'm looking forward to staying put for a while now, bedding down for the winter, and weathering the inevitable 5-month-long storm with a tempest of winter soups and roasted vegetables.

I have a few more things to write about my experiences in Canada, which I hope to do in the next week or so, so feel free to drop back in on me here once in a while. Until then, happy autumn!

Just Like That

The last few days have been rather uneventful ones, post-Ferdinand. I spent that morning replacing my torn tire and blown-out tube from the skid, and sewing up my saddle bag and jacket, and just generally regaining my composure. By the time I was all back together again, I had lost much of the day, and I was already running behind schedule in my goal of making it to Glacier before my sister's upcoming birthday. I decided to hitch a ride to make up for lost time, and to dull the growing monotony of the seemingly endless mountains and valleys. I was carried down the highway by a lovely recently-retired couple from Vancouver Island, who fed me homemade cookies, and laded me with a bag full of produce and salmon sandwiches before parting ways again.

One of many, many passes.

My last night on the road had me climbing into the Rockies, ever closer to the continental divide, the mountainous seam that separates and distinguishes the Pacific and Atlantic watersheds. Wind brewed threateningly, and the smell of rain was on the air. I found a bucolic, abandoned old barn to spend the night in, tucking myself in to a perfect bed of hay, and watched as the clouds continued moving on, revealing the blazing night stars behind them. I slept peacefully and soundly, warm and content, and even more so when I awoke at 5am, liminally aware of the downpour that had belatedly begun outside, accentuating my dry and serene state.

As the downpour continued on through the morning, I met my sister on the road, and got a ride across the border and down to her temporary home of Saint Mary, just outside the park itself. By this time, the rain had turned into a heavy snowstorm, and, antithetical as it may be to the notion of bike travel, I was endlessly grateful for the comfort and amenities that the car offered. I settled in to the pie that has been promised me all summer long, a fresh salad larger than my cranial capacity (insert self-deprecating remark here), and my first shower in almost two weeks of sweat, dirt and sunscreen. It's good to be here, and despite the forecast of continuing rain, I am perfectly content to relax in a dry place for the next few days in good company, and enjoy the simple pleasures.

I may've earned myself some downtime, but, to be sure, this trip is far from over. Stay tuned...

Bowling for Ungulates

My morning began with a light drizzle awakening me from my slumber, instead of the typical first rays of dawn. Fortunately, the clouds were generous enough to hold off on the downpour until I was able to get my gear all packed up and weatherized for the day. Prepared for the morning showers, I climbed onto my bike and started back toward the road, a single-lane, minimally-traveled back country offshoot of Highway 3, nestled in the foothills of the Kootenay Mountains. As the highway wound through a narrow valley bed, virtually every road off it was a climb into the mountains, and this one proved to be no exception. Having done the climbing the previous night in order to find a camp site, I enjoyed the prospect of a quick downhill jaunt back down to the highway, to be back on my merry way.

I quickly built up speed as I descended to the valley floor in the pouring rain. As I made my way around one of the tight bends, though, I suddenly came across a monstrous bull moose who was standing directly across the roadway, legs ever so slightly splayed, peeing in the middle of the road and looking quite content to do so. Much like having a wall appear in front of you as you hurtle down the highway at 40 kph, this was no trivial matter. I quickly jammed on my brakes and tried to swerve around it at the same time, a predictably poor combination, all the more so on wet roads. My rear tire skidded out from under me, and down I went, still careening directly toward the moose, who seemed in no particular hurry to move. It was about at this point that it started looking like the end to me.

It was also at this point, however, that time started moving in slow-motion, as it is fabled to do in dire enough circumstances. I remember sliding under the moose and looking up at it, and, in the same way that that kid from Free Willy must've surely thought during the climactic slo-mo jumping scene, "Oh god, this whale is going to crush me," I thought, "Oh god, this thing is going to come down on me." But as I continued skidding, through the damp mat of hanging hair and through the stream of pee (yes, I was peed on by a moose, okay?), I began to think differently. Indeed, I continued my slide, bike and all, right between those four gangly legs, and on down the road, coming to a stop a few metres past him. (I suppose the combination of the smooth asphalt, the rain and my rain gear turned the whole road into something of a slip'n'slide.)

I quickly scrambled to my feet and wheeled around, yelling, "What the HELL?", and "Have you no sense of self-preservation?" (well, given the circumstances, probably something considerably less eloquent and more profane). The bull turned and glared at me, still peeing, and I quickly realized my place, which was, quite simply, to be scared out of my wits. I hastily hobbled to what I perceived to be a safer distance, and surveyed the damage. Though my gear took some hits (torn saddle bag, ripped bar tape, etc.), I seemed to come out relatively unscathed, save for a sore shoulder, a slightly wrenched back, and an oncoming bout of nausea from the adrenaline.

I looked back up the road at the moose, who had by now sauntered off to the trees. I looked at my iPod, which I had only just put on to an episode of This American Life, and only a small fraction of time had passed. Did that really just happen?

Now, I know that I seem to have missed all four legs, but I'm going to go ahead and chalk that up as a strike anyway. And to you, Mr. Moose, I officially dub thee Ferdinand. May you enjoy a long and happy life sniffing daisies under a peaceful tree somewhere.

Into the Okanagan

Number of kilometres: 1,839

Starting from the touristy town of Hope, the TCT picked right back up again, with a popular and promising section known as the Kettle Valley Railway, a stretch of abandoned rail corridor that passes through the mountains, all the way to Castlegar, more than 600 kilometres eastward. I held high hopes for this stretch, in that it was considerably more established and straightforward than the roundabout winding that the trail had heretofore been doing through more urban areas. It started off with a bang with the Othello Tunnels, one of the most stunning places I've seen in my life.

The Othello Tunnels in Coquihalla Canyon Provincial Park are a relic of one the most hubristic engineering feats in rail history. Andrew McCulloch, chief engineer of the KVR (one hundred years ago), was determined to carve a railway route through the treacherous canyon, contrary to other engineers' opinions about whether or not it could be done. McCulloch spent weeks dangling in a woven basket suspended from ropes on sheer cliff faces, chipping away ledges to set up surveying equipment. In the end, he successfully built four tunnels in quick succession, attached by two bridges, while achieving the status as the most expensive mile of railway to build in the world. McCulloch was something of a Shakespeare aficionado, and in addition to entertaining his workers with the Bard's tales by evening firelight, he named many of the railway stops after his characters (I passed through Juliet, Romeo, Portia, Jessica, Lear and Iago). The result of his work was truly unbelievable, even while standing in the middle of it.

The Othello Tunnels.

Unfortunately, the trail quickly descended to its usual state soon thereafter, and after getting lost twice, rescued by several phone calls to Google Maps, and a particularly difficult stretch that took me the better part of a day to make a mere 22 km, I decided once and for all that I am officially done with the Trans Canada Trail; there is simply no reason to continue putting myself through the hell that this trail provides, not on this trip, and not on this bike. So it's back to the highways for me, hurray! I am much, much happier at the notion of riding on the familiar pavement once more, my nose raised to the wind instead of buried in a book that's dictating the adventure I'm supposed to be having. We now return from Scott's Cycling Slog to our regularly scheduled Biking Blag.

Passing through the Northern Cascades and back to Highway 3, I entered the familiar Okanagan Valley, where the aggressively verdant forests of the west gave way to the more subdued sagebrush of the east, and fruit trees, fruit trees, fruit trees. Whereas Vancouver gets more than 100 centimetres of rain per year, the Okanagan, hiding in the rainshadow of the Cascades, gets less than 30. Of course, much of those 30 would opt to fall as soon as I got here; the last two days have been a soggy, wet affair. As I descended in the valley, wildfires raged in the mountains alongside the highway, but the smoke intermingled with the clouds to become an indiscernible fog amoungst the trees.

The Okanagan Valley.

I stopped in the city of Keremeos for a reprieve from the rain, but the only laundromat in town was closed, for the owner's wife was in labour. I settled into a nice little French bistro, where I quickly discovered a teeming population of wayward youth in an otherwise backward little town. Turns out Keremeos is something of a mecca for cultural flotsam, bringing in people from all over the country for a summer's worth of fruit picking, and slow country life. I met some lovely folk who offered me a free place to camp, and even some work picking pears if I wanted it, but I was determined to get over the upcoming Richter Pass, and hopefully out of the rain.

The appropriately-named Spotted Lake.

After spending an entire morning tied up in the eternal balagan of international commerce and banking, I decided that the easiest solution to my monetary crisis would be to just pop back over the border to Oroville, WA, and try and work out my banking woes here. (While waiting for the financial gears to do their grinding, I ran into an old roommate from Seattle, Chelsea, who now lives 'round these here parts.) After one more stop at the bank, it's back up to Canada for me, where an eastward highway, a nice tailwind, and maybe even some sun to dry my sodden feet await me. Ah, life is good, once more.

Reality Sinks In

Number of kilometres: 1,469
Fastest speed: 68.57 kph
Money left: CA$160.12, US$55.00

Vancouver Island finished up quite pleasantly; a hot day's ride left me in isolated mountains on my last night, on the top of a cliff face overlooking the Nanaimo River. My oversight of refilling on water in the previous town had been solved by a couple of swimmers I ran across, who were emptying out a leaking cooler, and I filled up on gloriously refreshing ice, and was even gifted a couple of perfectly chilled beers for the road. ("Better take two, man," he said, with a knowing grin. "Cause beer is like women: two is always better than one.") The following morning I hiked the few kilometres down to the river, and then got back on my merry way, just a couple of hours' ride from the ferry terminal in Nanaimo. The ferry was a monstrous beast of six levels, with enough parking space for a large fleet of semis. The ride across the Strait of Georgia back to the mainland was peacefully idyllic (if a bit chilly), with sweeping vistas of mountains in every direction, and periodic pods of porpoises breaking the otherwise calm waters alongside us.

The ferry ride ended at Horseshoe Bay, still a fair distance away from Vancouver proper, and the day quickly turned into a sweaty battle over the pointlessly gruesome hills of affluent North Vancouver; after more than an hour of rollercoaster-like neighborhoods, I decided to ditch the proscribed TCT path, in lieu of a much more direct route into town.

Vancouver is a charming city, oozing with a sense of dignified confidence and cleanliness, perhaps the residuals of the massive cleanup efforts for the recent Winter Olympics. The population is far more international than anything I've ever seen in the states, with a multitude of languages being heard on every street corner and neighborhood. The fashion trend is overwhelmingly French, and everyone, French or not, is unfailingly kind. Vancouver also puts to shame the American notion of "bicycle-friendly" cities, no doubt helped by their bicycle-commuting mayor; a vast grid of bike paths and lanes, innumerable signs reminding cars of our existence, and frequent right of way makes city riding easy, safe and care-free.

Vancouver's awesome library.

Unfortunately, my housing plans in Vancouver ended up falling through, with my friend who lives here currently off to Burning Man. This left me in the position of being homeless, yet again, in a major metropolitan city as the sun is just starting to set. I'm generally comfortable with this scenario, but it'd been a hot few days, and good god, I just wanted a shower and a couch to sit on. As fortune would have it, though, my saviour came in the form of a fellow intrepid cyclist, Naomi, who offered me a last-minute place. We spent the evening watching Back To The Future at an outdoor screening in a nearby city park, and talking about travel possibilities across the province (she biked solo across the country a year or two before, and had much advice to offer).

Clean, content, well-stocked and well-fed, I prepared to set off on the road again, only to realize, quite disastrously, that I no longer have my bank card on me. I slowly cycled out of town, pondering the consequences of this development, with no good solution coming to mind. As fate would have it, the trail out of town turned instantly brutal once more, pushing me to my absolute limits of riding ability on the bike I have with me. I ended up a mere forty kilometres out of downtown, after hours of more bicycle push-ups, bruised palms, and cramped fingers from excessive brake use. As I unfurled my tent in a thick copse of trees that night, a roaring thunderstorm started to break overhead, and in that moment, I experienced a period of delirium, fueled by the utter ridiculousness of the situation: I've put myself in another country, alone, unfamiliar with the road ahead, with access only to the bit of money I have on hand, and there's fucking lightning crashing down all around me. I love it. This is the adventure, right here, and from here on out.

Indian Arm Fjord from the top of Burnaby Mountain, just outside Vancouver.

My enthusiasm was severely tempered the following morning, as I awoke to pouring rain, and the realization that I forgot to take the extremely important set of bike tools from Shannan's bag before she departed. Feeling about as heavily discouraged as possible (knocking on wood for flat tires), I trudged on. At some point, this has to start flying in the face of reason and into the realm of stupidity, but I'm not sure when that is. There seem to be a lot of things getting in my way of continuing, but I'm inclined to keep going until it's just not possible anymore. We'll see. I have a new set of tools (but not enough money for bear spray), and I'm all dry again, both of which help my spirits immensely. Bring on the mountains, and then we'll see how I feel...


Barn's burnt down --
now I can see the moon.
-Mizuta Masahide

Canada, Minus One

Number of miles: 799

The layover in Centralasia served a twofold purpose: visiting friends, and giving Shannan's knees a day's rest. They'd been bothering her some, as they had at the start of her bike trip last summer, and she knew from experience that some down time was just what they needed to recover. We set off for Olympia in high spirits.

Just after passing through Olympia, however, they started hurting quite a bit again. We found a place to camp and stopped for the day, and the following morning she hitched a ride up the Olympic Peninsula to Quilcene, where her family has a cabin. This gave her another day's rest while I rode on to catch up to her. The ride was a spectacular one, the highway skirting the edge of Hood Canal much of the way, starfish and dungeness crabs viewable from the literal roadside. Once I arrived, we both took a relaxing day at the cabin together (aside from a brief forty-mile ride to Port Townsend for groceries), picking blackberries, cooking good food and canoeing around Lake Leland.

Lake Leland and the Olympic foothills from the cabin's porch.

When we started out the next day, it seemed clear relatively early on that Shannan's knee problems were not getting much better; despite frequent icing, ibuprofens, arnica salve and resting time, the pain was continuing to flare, and even begin to spread as her body tried to adjust to different riding postures. We had a scenic ride along the Olympic Discovery rails-to-trails to Port Angeles, where we stayed the night while discussing our options.

A trestle through an old-growth canopy on the Olympic Discovery Trail.

The following morning we caught the ferry to Victoria, to spend a slow day in town being ridiculously touristy, as is surely impossible to avoid in Victoria. To paraphrase a not-too-wise lump of clay, though, there was no use prevaricating around the bush; we both knew Shannan couldn't continue on without risking permanent damage to her knees, if such a thing hadn't happened already. She made the difficult decision of heading back home by ferry and bus, while I made the equally difficult decision of continuing on this trip by myself. This adventure had been weeks in the planning for us, and it was more than a little heartbreaking to see it change so drastically right on the doorstep of the new and unexplored.

Victorian Parliament.

But, as it turns out, Shannan was quite right in her decision. My first day's ride out of Victoria was probably the most physically demanding I've ever been through. I am giving my best attempt at following the Trans Canada Trail, a bicycle route that, in theory, goes from Victoria all the way to Newfoundland. (In practice, it is an underdeveloped work in progress, with frequent gaps and detours.) Much of the trail makes use of existing local trailways, abandoned railroad corridors, and logging roads; as such, my skinny road tires are often not optimally suited for the boulderific trails more appropriate for mountain bikes.

The TCT started promisingly enough, right from the ferry's gate, and onto the Galloping Goose bike trail, a splendid paved path out of town that has seniority over all other traffic. It soon ended, though, and then spit me onto the shoulder of Highway 1, hugging hellish hills for hours. The path eventually split off again, and connected to the vast network of Cowichlan Valley trails. Beautiful, flat, isolated trails ran through miles (er, kilometres) of rainforest and rivers. All was well once more, until the sudden appearance of the dreaded Kinsol Trestle. One of the highest railroad trestles in the world, the Kinsol currently touts derelict status, which is unfortunate, given that the TCT is routed right over it. Construction is currently in the works to have it open again by 2011, but in the meantime, I was rerouted through a poorly-marked, backbreaking 10-km bypass, which had me wedging my bike through logging fences, up brutal logging roads, and one particular 4-km stretch of footpath through the forest that was signed as "not recommended for bicycles", which proved to be quite the understatement. Most all of it had to be either walked, slid downhill, or "push-upped" steep embankments, which involved establishing a firm footing, pushing my bike and gear up about a foot, locking the brakes and then taking a step forward and doing it again, frequently sliding backward in the dirt. Three hours, one flat tire, and one comical spill over my handlebars and into the bushes, and I was finally through.

The soon-to-be resurrected Kinsol Trestle.

The road has since been its more forgiving combination of highway shoulders and backcountry roads, and tomorrow I'll be taking the ferry from Nanaimo to Vancouver. It's been a humbling experience here on the island so far, and more likely than not, a sign of what's to come. (I've even seen a bear already.) It's no longer the trip that I planned for, but I'm glad that I have experience with this kind of travel.

The path most simple
is rarely the easiest
but still we go on.

[P.S. I'll try and post some pictures in Vancouver, if I can find some access to a computer that doesn't come with a librarian breathing down my neck.]

A Brief Detour to Central Asia

Nary a man has lived as mightily and magnanimously as my friend and former roommate Francis, of Contrapparatus fame. Having graced the city of Seattle with his presence for the last couple of years, he has moved on to greener and more familial pastures about ninety miles down the road, in the quaint little town of Centralia, or, more familiarly, Centralasia. Though hearts and bodies might move on, the brethrenhood of the traveling Lunies lives on, and it was a quick and easy decision to make the side trip inland to go and visit while we were passing on by on our way up north.

Having traversed our way around the romantically tranquil Willapa Bay, we began what was supposed to be a Rails-to-Trails from coastal-ish Raymond to inland-Chehalis, but turned out to be a mere Rails-to-not-Rails, in that the old railway had been removed, but the trail had not been further developed, and in some places was even still littered with railroad spikes. After a brief attempt at riding through foot-deep gravel, we opted instead for the paralleling Highway 6. It started out promisingly enough with generous shoulders and a minimum of traffic, but quickly went south upon entering 24 miles of highway construction, replete with torn up roads, tar that covered my tires with gravel, and monstrous trucks that preferred to pretend I wasn't there. The return of scorching sun and heat iced the cake to make for one of the worst days of riding I've ever had, but the arrival in Centralasia made up for it all.

Francis lives at Coffee Creek Community and Gardens, a rustic farm nestled in a wooded valley. The lack of running water is made up for in the abundance of produce, animals and kindness that the place and people exuded. We spend a day's rest there, helping out a bit at the Chehalis farmers' market, washing some clothes, and just taking it easy.

During last summer's bicycle travels, Shannan and I stayed at an Mennonite intentional community in Minneapolis that we had found on Couchsurfing. It was a bustling house hopping with activity, and while we were there, there were a couple of other travelers, including a fellow named Seth from Portland, and Derrick from North Carolina. (As it turned out, I ran into Derrick again later that summer in Pittsburgh, during the G20 protests.) Imagine our surprise, then, when, across the country and on another bicycle trip together, we ran into Seth, who now lives on a farm here in Centralasia, and with Derrick, no less. Now, I know it's a small, small world and all, but running into the same person in three random places all across the country in the space of less than a year, with no pre-arranged contact in between? I have to say, it bemusedly blew my mind a little.

A brief moment of terror occurred during the market, when a sudden pair of explosions rocked the vegetable stands and flexed the windows on all the buildings around us. Francis was in the middle of playing music for a festive audience, but a collective silence seized the crowd. We figured it had been some kind of factory explosion outside of town, but it just turned out to be the now famed Obama sonic boom, the jets roaring past us on the way from Portland.

We're all rested up and clean again now, and hitting the road again early tomorrow morning, Olympia-bound, and then up the peninsula. Look out oysters, here I come...

Hello Coast, Goodbye Sunscreen

The first task at hand was to find a route to the coast that didn't involve the relentless pounding of traffic and logging trucks, a task accomplished by simply riding out of town on the friendliest road I knew, and continuing to follow friendly-looking roads in a vaguely northwestern direction. The route took us through back-road Willamette Valley vineyards territory (with tasting aplenty), and quickly up into the national forest of the coastal range, where traffic virtually disappeared. We wheeled our way through thickets of thimbleberries and brambles of blackberries that suffered a surfeit of fruit, and we gorged our guts to gustatory satisfaction. A perfect amount of sun, clouds, and mild wind combined to create ideal conditions for the start of a trip.

Our arrival at the coast was laughably cliché, in that the coastline was tightly enshrouded in thick clouds, visible as a looming grey wall that grew to encompass us as we approached. My map said that the average summer temperature of the Oregon Coast is 58 degrees, a statistic I would come to find impossible to refute. While the rest of the country sweltered through a heatwave, I shivered along miles of highway, wrapped up in layers of long underwear under my jacket.

The Oregon Coast is part of one of the most well-traveled bicycle routes in the entire country, a literal interstate of cyclists from all over the world with all sorts of agendas: I met a family that left their home in Vancouver with their six- and two-year-old daughters, to hit the road for a couple of years, with no previous bicycling experience; a Brit making his way southward from Alaska; an eighteen-year-old from South Korea who is making his way to his first year of college in Vancouver by way of El Salvador; tandems and recumbents; ultra-lightweight speedsters and folks who just couldn't stand to leave their cast-iron ware at home. Everybody is out on the road; I even ran into a friend of mine from Seattle who was on his way down to Santa Barbara. (Hell, I even got passed by my mom in a car somewhere between Cannon Beach and Seaside.) And of course, most every one of them is headed in the opposite direction, as everyone knows that you're supposed to bike from north to south; the prevailing summer winds are said to dismantle a cyclist's spirits in the space of a schoolgirl's wink. As a result, much of the road's shoulders have only been developed one the west side, whereas the northern route contains potholes large enough to pitch a tent in. This, at least, was the word on the street...

As it turned out, however, it was a fine ride. The most tedious part was having to cross the highway traffic every time I wanted to stop and see something on the ocean side. Otherwise, the shoulders are quite manageable, and the wind, that fickle mistress, seemed just as likely to blow with you as against you.

A deceivingly fleeting sunbreak.

Several days worth of beaches, an almost equal number of days of clouds, one astounding Fata Morgana-esque sunset, and one mandatory visit to Rogue Brewery later, we made it to Astoria, last stop in Oregon before crossing the Bridge of Bicyclist Doom, more commonly known as the Astoria Bridge, a four-mile truss bridge spanning the mouth of the Columbia River. I'd previously crossed it twice before, once in each direction, and each time was a harrowing experience, sandwiched in a nonexistent bike lane between reckless logging trucks out for blood and a very long fall to some very uninviting waters. Fortune favours the bold, however; the bike lanes had been doubled in width since my last crossing, and we hit it on a Sunday morning, with a minimum of traffic. Aside from the thoroughly traumatic experience of watching a cormorant fly head into an oncoming car a few feet in front of me, it was an uneventful crossing.

Abandon hope, all ye who cross here...

It'll be time to start heading inland very soon; I'll be curious how long it takes for the sun to creep back out and make me miserable.

Fleeing the Country

August is upon us, in all her august majesty. The days are imperceptibly shortening, while the heat wears on. Languid summer spirits are subconsciously discomfited, motivated by the season's inevitable end on distant horizons. A prescient warning whispers quietly with the occasional breeze: enjoy it now, because it ain't gonna last. A stirring in my blood beckons me to heed the call, because after all, what are summers for? Not riding your bike off into the sunset? I don't think so...

I've got my proverbial ducks all lined up, and most loose ends neatly tucked away in places where they're easily forgotten. I've completed a hard month of work, the Oregon Country Fair has come and gone, and I just finished a few weeks of dad time with my daughter Maia and my nephews. The weeks before me are free free free, and I shall utilize them to the fullest; it's time to hit the road once more. This time, though, I shan't be riding by myself, but rather in the company of Shannan, my dear friend, fellow nerd, and heretofore riding partner. Shannan is currently in graduate school at the U of O, and she likewise has several weeks before her erstwhile academic responsibilities resume once more.

As some (such as myself) might remember, my sister Amy is spending the summer working in Glacier National Park, having graduated earlier this previous spring. Shannan has never been to Glacier before, a situation which we both agree must be immediately remedied, so the solution is obvious. I did, however, just ride from Portland to Missoula a few months ago, and am not terribly interested in retracing the same route so soon after, so we've been shopping around for an exciting new route. And I ask you, dear readers, what could possibly be more exciting than traveling in another country?

Yes! Canada, a foreign a place as can possibly be conceived of: who knows what bizarre customs we will encounter? What exotic faunae permeates the landscape? Hell, I'm not even sure what language they speak. But I do know that I'll be showing up on their doorstep, embiggened with an adventurous spirit, passport in hand, ready to embrace my northerly neighbors. In the meantime, if anyone reading this has ever heard of Canada and knows anything about its backward ways, I'd appreciate any advice you have to share. I'm already bringing my tiger spray, though, so I've got that part covered.

The basic plan has us heading from Eugene to the coast, up to the Olympic Peninsula, ferrying to Vancouver Island, over to the mainland, and across BC, eventually dropping down into Glacier from above, where I fully expect my sister to serve me some pie when I get there. I'll be hungry, dammit.

A notable difference of this trip for me will be my relative lack of portable media, given that my stupid iPod Touch bit the dust about a month ago, less than a year old (mandatory e-waste rant excluded here for brevity). I will still try and blag when I can, but I'm not even sure if Canada has the internet yet, so we'll just have to see what's possible.

If all goes according to plan, I hit the road on Monday. See you out there, eh?

That's All, Folks!

Total number of miles: 921
Total number of hours: 81

Oh, right, I'm still maintaining a blag. Funny how quickly the mind moves on.

During my final few days in Tum Tum, I kept a constant eye on the weather forecast, which prophesized endless weeks of rain, all across the dreary state of Washington. It was an easy decision to make: I'd ridden my bicycle, I'd gone the places and seen the people I wanted to; I had nothing to prove to myself about my abilities as a cyclist, and no particular "completist" mentality. And, perhaps most importantly, I had myself a free ride to Seattle, since Katherine would be returning from one home to another soon. I tossed my bike in her car, blew a kiss to the land, and trundled across the state, tracing the sodden path that I would've otherwise pedaled.

I spent a luxurious few days in Seattle hunkered down at a friend's house, avoiding most any sort of notion of responsibility before my inevitable return to the innumerable loose ends that comprise the tapestry of my life. By a rather uninteresting set of circumstances, my car was waiting for me in Seattle, and it was thus a quick and easy jaunt back to Eugene, save for a stopover in Portland for some birthday bowling with the nephews (happy birthday, Eamon!).

And here I am, back to life as usual. Kind of. If there's one thing I've noticed, it's that I don't seem to excel at holding any kind of "usual" pattern to my life; the stream of ideas, passions, inspirations and adventures flow as steadily as time, guiding me ever onward to new horizons and new places. When I first started this trip, I said that it couldn't've come at a better time for me, and in retrospect, it's easy for me to say that it couldn't've served me better; these short few weeks have provided me with no less than two major epiphanies about the course of my life, and I'm returning to the fray with a sense of clarity that has escaped me for months. Perhaps a river would be a more apt metaphor than the simile of time: as Heraclitus said, you can never step into the same river twice; indeed, the life I return to now, the life that is before me, feels ever different than the life I left behind just a short month ago. If I've been carried away in the current of the last half-year, this month I learned how to swim again. This, as much as anything, is what makes it all worthwhile.

Thanks for reading, everyone. You can probably expect another trip sometime later this summer, if you care to check back in. In the meantime, let's all try and be conscious of the long-term consequences of our actions, however small or insignificant they may seem, and think good thoughts about the ocean; it needs some serious lovin' right now, just like the rest of us.

Love,
Scott


View Portland to Missoula in a larger map

Friends, Friends, Everywhere

The road from Missoula started off promisingly, with one of my most pleasant days of riding on this trip yet. Highway 200 provided a gentle route paralleling the Clark Fork river (and thus avoiding any passes), traversing a comparatively easy path through rugged mountains, against a backdrop of sprawling vistas of gentle valleys girded by snow-capped ranges. A blue sky filled with fluffy, tame clouds and breaking sun and a light wind at my back completed the picture of an ideal day of riding. I met a fellow cyclist, Wes, who’s been circumnavigating the states for the last ten months, from New York to Florida to California to Washington, and is currently on his way back home to New York. (A bit more ambitious than me, I think, but who knows what the future holds?...) A gushing roadside artesian well provided me with the sweetest water just when it was most needed, and an isolated spot in a copse of trees on the bank of the river beckoned me to bed down at the end of the day. In all the ways that the road can give to a traveler, this day showed no end to its magnanimity. From the waterside, I watched the stars and bats and vespertine birds awaken from their slumber as I slipped into mine. I was happy I had checked the weather forecast before I left town, though, because any other night I would’ve simply unrolled my sleeping bag under the open sky; instead, I enjoyed the comfort that a warm tent provides when a torrential storm decides to blow through in the middle of the night.

The following day couldn’t’ve stood in sharper contrast. I snuggled up in bed longer than usual, hoping that the morning rain would soon pass. A couple of hours later, with not respite in sight, I resigned myself to the idea of a soggy day, and headed off into the all-too-familiar grey. A fierce headwind tore at me relentlessly, the bitterly cold rain continued to fall, and my slight downhill of the day before had somehow turned into an entire day of inexplicable uphill battle, despite me continuing to follow in the path of the river. Nearing the end of the day, I had barely logged a paltry 40 miles, and I was just beginning to think about looking for a place to set up camp and call it quits for the day, when a person in a car flagged me down from the side of the road. A woman, Sarah, had driven by me a few minutes before, and had turned around after a couple of miles to come offer me a dry place to sleep for the night. She directed me to her house about eight miles further down the highway (and somehow, the road suddenly turned downhill again), where I stayed with her and her two-year-old son. In a truly generous display of Montana hospitality, I was fed a dinner of elk steaks with sautéed mushrooms, a nourishingly warm and brothy mushroom soup, salad, and woken in the morning with farm-fresh eggs and blueberry pancakes with homemade raspberry jam. Sarah was a transplant from Portland with a well-honed astuteness (she surmised, by my piercings and the fact that I had started in Portland, that I was a vegetarian, but by my horns, that I wasn’t vegan). As it turned out, that night was her and her husband’s fourth anniversary, but he was off in Helena on some work-related training, and we joked about her having dinner with another man on her anniversary. I was sent off in the morning fed, warm and dry, laden with apples, and in high spirits once again.

I made it to Sandpoint that afternoon, where I met up with an old friend, Justin, whom I briefly lived with in Seattle. I stayed with him for a day, spending much of my time recovering from a hangover from my first night there. (Note: absinthe is always bad news.) His friend, Florence, was visiting from Quebec for the summer, here to see the States for the first time and practice her English, and I got to practice all my mad French skills (voulez-vous du beurre?) in turn. I hadn’t seen Justin in almost two years, and he’ll likely be moving out to Portland, Maine this coming fall after going on (musical) tour this summer, so I’m glad I got the time to visit and catch up with him, before he makes his flight from this lovely corner of the continent.

From Sandpoint I made a mad dash to Tum Tum, WA, a place I once called home, and is easily one of the most special and sacred places I’ve ever been. My friend, Katherine, has 100 acres of rural mountain land, bordered by expansive DNR property and similarly conservation-minded neighbors; she and another friend Rob and I all lived out here about five years ago, gardening, brewing, saunaing, and communing our way through a quiet revolution of spirit. By astounding coincidence, both Katherine and Rob were both out at the land when I got here on Sunday, despite Katherine currently living in Seattle, Rob near San Diego, and me in Eugene; this has been the first time the three of us have been together in several years, and all that’s missing is a pair of goats, a cat and a deceased dog to complete the family once again.

Sunset at Vision Mountain.

It’s been every bit as soul-nourishing as always to be out the mountain, and all the better to experience a serendipitous and unexpected reunification of community. Springtime is far and away the best time of the year to be here, with still verdant hillsides filled with blooming burdock, lupine, shooting stars and bitterroot. I've taken a few days here for myself so far, basking in sun and old friendships, hiking, chopping wood, and enjoying the silence that permeates the air. Lack of cellular telephone service and good ol' fashioned dial-up internet couldn't serve me much better right now.

Missoula Oblongata

I begin by extending a warm and heartfelt congratulations to Ms. Amy Elizabeth Conner, who has now successfully joined the burgeoning ranks of the certifiably educated youth of this country. You will find that your degree opens all sorts of new doors for you, paving the path to such illustrious careers as, say, dishing up pie in a tourist café, to lathe operator in a baby carrot factory, or, even better, several more years of school! I'm proud of your hard work, and excited for the road that lays ahead of you, whatever that may be.

Amy's moment, in all her dorky splendor.

The passing of a rather tedious Saturday morning of ceremonies and barely-audible speeches was eased by the company of parents, grandparents, siblings and nephews, dinner and wine with the family, and, of course, the requisite evening bender with my sisters and some of Amy's friends. The downtown area was awash with the effluvium of the University of Montana's newest graduating class and their restless relatives, funk bands tearing off proverbial roofs, and people looking to celebrate the beginning of warm, leisurely summer nights. The whiskey shots flowed like wine, hips swayed like trees in the wind, college students stumbled like, well, college students, and Amy, bless her heart, braved it all like the trooper she is, despite an interminable case of bronchitis.

Of course, dorkiness begets dorkiness.

Following the next morning's diaspora of family members to their respective corners of the Northwest, Amy, my dad and I took the opportunity to hit the road for a couple of days, rejoicing in the fact that none of us had any pressing responsibilities to tend to, save the savouring of one another's company and our surroundings.

Our first destination was Wildhorse Island, a remote state park in the middle of Flathead Lake, the largest natural freshwater lake west of the Mississippi (how's that for qualifiers?). (For centuries, the native Salish Indian tribe would store their horses on the island to discourage raids from the neighboring Blackfoot tribe, and a small herd inevitably turned feral.) The island is rife with bighorn sheep, coyote, deer, and yes, still a few wild horses. When I was thirteen (and with my permission, just to clarify), my dad took me to the island for a vision quest, leaving me to fend for myself for a few days without any food. Sadly, mid-May is a bit early for snow melt here, and the lake's level was too low to be able to rent a boat, and we were never able to make it to the island. Instead, we drove the 90-mile loop around the lake, and wound our way up to the top of Chief Cliff, which provides a spectacular overlook of the area. We crossed paths with a black bear and mountain lion (first real sighting of my life!), and found a small herd of bighorn sheep at the top.

Flathead Lake and Wildhorse Island from the top of Chief Cliff.

From there we wended our way into the rugged Mission Mountains for the night, and through the National Bison Range the next morning, passing through plains of grazing herds of bison and antelope.

Morning dawns on the Mission Mountains.

I'm back in Missoula now, preparing to hit the road again first thing tomorrow morning, just in time for more rain, rain, rain. In the meantime, I'm reclining with a beer and a mimosa, enjoying the sweet smell of the fresh precipitation, the sporadic crack of lightning and roll of thunder, and the memories of a week well-spent back home in the wild, wild West.

Lochsa Loveliness

Number of miles: 619
Number of hours spent pedaling: 54
Average number of comments made per day about my helmet: 3
Percentage of comments that utilize the phrase "horny guy": 80
Number of pending lawsuits from Harper's Index: 1


Living in this country, and particularly the Northwest, I've sometimes felt deprived of a rich and expansive cultural history, given the difficulty of, say, finding a building more than even 150 years old. How easy it is to forget, though, the ghosts that we've buried of those that were here before us whities. Virtually my entire bike trip thus far has retraced the path of Lewis and Clark on their commissioned travels out west some 200 years ago, and every mile has been teeming with placards that tell the stories of a different time. Many of the hills and mountains are carved with paths that've been trodden for several thousands of years, part of a vast and intricate trade network all across the continent. One night I camped on the shores of a river bend that was the site of an ancient Nez Perce village, and has been used as a popular fishing site for more than 10,000 years. Many of the mountainsides and river valleys through the Idaho portion of the trip have been left largely intact, with trees towering and forests self-regulating as they have been for millennia. Wending my way alongside the Lochsa river, through endless expanses of gently rolling mountains effused with tumbling creeks that still burgeon with salmon and steelhead, past countless hot springs that burble out from river rock, the scent of warm cedar and fresh rain kissing thirsty soil wafting on the wind, it's very easy to feel like I was born in the wrong century; I can't help but think that I would've done well here a few hundred years ago.

A more gentle stretch of the Lochsa River.

I finally encountered some other travelers along the way. Over the course of three days, I played an extended game of leap frog with a hitchhiker, Jim, from Kentucky. He was on his way to Butte, MT, to visit his mother; every morning I'd pass him on the side of the road, only to see him wave at me from a car as he passed by later that afternoon. I finally lost him somewhere during an 80-mile stretch of nothingness, so presumably he found a ride that carried him past my reach. I also met some other cyclists, who were just finishing their first week of a speedy two-month jaunt across the country. They had a support car following them, replete with tents, propane stoves, and, um, a generator, so they were sailing across the terrain with unladen cycles. I camped with them for a night, and they were incredibly gracious hosts, sharing dinner with me, and pancakes the next morning to boot. Of course, as it turned out, they were all Bible-thumping evangelists, and the evening necessitated a fair amount of firm deflection of some very enthusiastic proselytizing. (Somewhat interestingly, not five minutes before meeting them on the road, I had just finished listening to an episode of This American Life that had examined the various techniques that religious zealots use to lure people into their sights; our first interactions while riding together were rife with many of the methods mentioned in the show.) I think I've managed to develop a healthy appreciation for the role that religion can play in another person's life, and the inspiration and solace they can find in it, but I have a very hard time hiding my disdain for other people telling me what I should think and how I should live, and how my beliefs (like, you know, carbon dating, for example) are wrong. Dudes, my name's Darwin, what more do you want from me? I'm finding this to be a surprisingly common phenomenon, though; evidently Christian God is telling lots of young, white males to get on their bicycles and go spread the Word far and wide. This was not the first time I've run into a group like this, and I daresay it shan't be the last...

The weather has been astonishingly coöperative ever since my last rainy day coming out of Lewiston. A combination of sunshine, pleasantly fluffy clouds, some inoffensive drizzle here and there, and crisp nights have made for ideal biking. I'd been looking forward to the Hwy 12 stretch of Idaho since I heard about it last summer from my friend, Shannan, who described it as one of her favourite places she'd ever biked through; built up as it's become to me, it proved to be nothing of a disappointment. I took a leisurely pace through the Lochsa Wilderness Area, taking time for a couple of off-road hikes, hot spring soakings, and even a couple of evening campfires (a luxury which I don't usually partake in while biking). There was still a decent amount of snow crossing over Lolo Pass, but nothing on the roads. (I think I either sunburned my eyes from the snow or pavement glare, or else irritated them from some extended wind-whipping, but they've been stinging for the past couple of days, and I keep seeing an odd rainbow halo around my shadow. Weird.)

A hot spring on the edge of Warm Springs Creek.

My dad passed me on the highway, only about fifteen miles outside of Missoula (he stopped to feed me some of mom's cookies, though). He got here early in order to tool around the western side of the state for a few days, exploring places from his (and my) childhood; I would've liked to have joined him, but he left Missoula only a few hours after I got here, leaving me hardly enough time even for a shower (which, for the sake of humanity, was quite needed). Fortunately, I think there'll be some time for that sort of activity once my sister's graduation is over and done with. Instead, I've spent the last couple of days relaxing here in town, exploring the night life a little, and spending some quality time with the li'l sis. I lived here for a couple of years as a child, and have come back to visit Montana often since. There are multiple generations of both sides of my family all over the state, and it's easy to feel at home here; I find the pace of life quite agreeable, a good deal more relaxed than typical city life, though, to be fair, Missoula is hardly a typical city. It's an interesting collision of west-coast liberalism and Libertarianesque leave-me-the-hell-alone attitude, as reflected in the chic dreadlock/cowboy boot pastiche that is found here.

On an entirely different note, I've heard feedback from a few different people about how difficult it is leaving comments on this blag, having to set up a profile or something first; I think I may've fixed that now, so I think y'all can just write something, if'n you feel the compunction.

La Monteillet Fromagerie

Number of miles: 363
Number of flat tires: 228
Minimum number of pounds of goat cheese consumed: 3

Me and my big mouth. I had to go and say something about how I hadn't had any flat tires. As I rode out of Walla Walla, soon after writing last, a thunderclap announced the arrival of a storm that immediately started dumping down a slurry of frigid sleet and hail. And of course, about five minutes later, I got a flat. I fixed my tube on the side of the highway, drenched from the sleet and the passing trucks, fingers quickly freezing without my gloves. By the time I got on the road again, I could no longer feel my fingers, and didn't have much warmth left with which to heat them up. Looking up the road at the expanse of looming clouds, I knew this would be a long, cold, cold night.

But! Luck was no stranger that day. By the time I neared the end of my day, the sun had returned enough to dry me out some, as had the feeling in my extremities. As the sun was setting and I was looking for a place to bed down for the night, I passed a goat farm that looked inviting enough. I sallied up to the door, and was immediately greeted with an enthusiastic embrace, congratulations, cheese and wine, before I could even say who I was or what I was doing. I was given an AirStream to stay in, known locally as the KyleStream, which had been given to the farm by Kyle MacLachlan, of Twin Peaks and Sex in the City fame (apparently he grew up around here or something). I was stuffed to the gills with wonderful food and saunaed well into the evening.

What passes for dog food at a fromagerie (I'm not kidding).

Monteillet Fromagerie is a gorgeous farm, owned by Pierre-Louis, an endearingly charming Frenchman, and his equally gregarious wife, Joan. Goats, sheep, dogs, cats, geese, ducks and chickens all run under feet around a sprawling, lush tract of gently-wooded grassland in the Walla Walla valley, cut through by the Touchet River. In was an easy decision to stay an extra day to help out some, and get to know the place better. After a day of weeding, plowing, food and wine and playing with animals, several of us drove to the nearby town to what I can confidently say was the best bar I've ever been to in my life. jimgermanbar is the brainchild of its namesake, Jim German, a Seattle transplant who has shunned the city lights and commotion, in lieu of a more low-key and intimate setting, to bring his noble gift to all who seek it: Master and God of the Cocktail. I tried (note: tried) six or seven different drinks from him, and every. single. one. was without a doubt the best cocktail I'd ever had. After my first few tastes, it was clear this was a man who could do no wrong; I didn't even bother picking something from the menu, but just asked them to bring me "something". Wow. If you're ever in the neighborhood, or even if you're not, good lord. It's worth the drive to Waitsburg.

Hello, friend.

I set off the next morning well rested, showered, laundered, and laden with cheese. Monteillet would be an exceptionally easy place to get sucked into (they offered to keep me for the week, and then drive me to Missoula, and I don't think they were kidding), but I was ready to get back on my bike. I had a pleasant, if non-descript, day of cycling ahead of me.

But ugh, today has been the most trying by far. I woke up to rain this morning, and after wheeling my bike out of the field of grass I camped in, found both of my tires completely flat. I spent the next two hours pulling out literally hundreds (I counted) of vicious thorns from my tires, portaging my bike and gear to safer ground, and reassembling. I was lucky (or just smart) to have been carrying two extra tubes with me, because there aren't enough tire patches in the country to have fixed those poor shredded tubes. It's continued to rain nonstop all day, and though I've only made it about fifteen miles so far today, as I look out the window from the familiar comfort of a library, it seems a daunting task to head back out into the dreariness. It helps to look on the bright side, though; at least I have goat cheese.

La Furia del Viento

Number of miles: 254
Number of flats: 0
Number of bugbites: 0
Number of other touring cyclists: 0

Well, starting a bicycle trip in early May is not without its risks. Things started out quite pleasantly, as only a trip along the Historic Columbia River Highway can be. Carving its way along and through cliff faces, past countless waterfalls, and endless forest, this highway is a cyclist's dream; not only are there generous bike lanes abound, but significant stretches of the highway have been closed to cars for decades, leaving the road to just you and a few scattered pedestrians.

The Columbia River, gorge-ous as ever.

A section of the Highway, closed to car traffic.

I've wanted to do this stretch Oregon for quite a while, but after a previous experience cycling in the Columbia Gorge, told myself I would only ever do it from West to East, as the wind goes. And boy, does it go. I had been enjoying a pleasant tail wind, up until my the morning of my second day, which had me crossing the river from The Dalles to connect up to Hwy 14. By this point, the wind had picked up considerably, and continued getting worse as the day went on. I ended up having to walk my bike across the bridge, and for most of the three miles up to 14; when I tried to ride, it took all of my forearm strength to not be pushed off the road, and I had to lean against the wind considerably. Any time a truck would pass me, though, I would fall over, as though a wall I'd been leaning on had suddenly evaporated. Once I got to the highway, however, it was one of the exceptionally rare circumstances on a bicycle where the wind seems to work entirely in your favour. There was one particularly memorable mile-long uphill stretch where I kept a steady 17mph pace without pedaling. Of course, one of the downsides to all the wind was that it made any stopping/resting nearly impossible; there was nowhere to avoid it, nothing to hide behind, and it chilled to the bone, hurt the skin, exhausted the ears. (Lest anyone think I exaggerate, I will report, sans hyperbole, that the next day's Tri-City Herald reported that windspeeds of up to 102mph were recorded in the Gorge, sections of highway were shut down, more than one town declared a civil emergency, and a windsurfer met an untimely end out on the river.

One advantage of going through the Gorge is that it's the only east-west route that manages to avoid a mountain pass in the Cascades, but I was still surprised at how quickly the climate shifted right on cue; within about ten miles, the landscape changed from verdant, mossy firs and ferns, to the familiar and more subtle ponderosas, sage and burdock root of the eastern slopes.

Admittedly, not the best design for a bike path.

It's been pretty cold at night. Anticipating this, I geared up a bit heavier than my trip last summer: more warm clothes, a tent instead of my tarp, and a new sleeping bag rated 15 degrees lower than my old one. Last night was the first night where wind or rain didn't keep me huddled inside my tent all night, and I took advantage of the clear skies by finding a clear patch of ground amidst the sagebrush to unroll my sleeping bag, and got my first good view of the spring stars. It got into the mid-thirties, I think, but was snuggly warm all night long. I've been fighting off a bug that's been living in my sinuses and throat, but, this morning aside, I seem to be winning that battle.

Other than that, it's been a fairly uneventful trip so far. Water has been suprisingly scarce, though much of the dry spell was through a stretch of Washington that simply had nothing there. As I start climbing elevation through the Columbia Plateau, though, I'm sure that'll change. Fer chris' sakes, I can see snow en them thar mountains, I know there must be runoff!

Once More Unto the Breach

Spring has sprung! (Sane) biking season is (sort of) upon us once again! Betwixt the omnipresent clouds and drizzle of the Northwest, beautiful riding opportunities are beginning to bloom once more, but, much like the most precious and tender blossoms of this verdant season, will only be appreciated by those who actively seek them out. My little sister, Amy, is graduating from the University of Montana on May 15th, and I, quite naturally, will be there to cheer (read: taunt) her success, that much is certain. The paths between here (here being Portland, at this moment) and Missoula, however, are wildly unpredictable, stunningly gorgeous, infinitely alluring. In short, most everything one could possibly want in an adventure, and, given that nothing in my life is categorically prohibiting me from holidaying for a few weeks, the choice is clear: come tomorrow morning, I'm going to make like a tree and get outta here, pedal power-style.

I realize it's been several months since I've written here, but, as previously stated, I've only really ever intended this to be a blag about bicycling, reporting on the aspects of my life that pertain to the world of cyclery, and not much more than that; that said, there have been some very relevant happenings since last October.

When I last wrote, I was intensely pining for a home, for my home, and was ready to resume a more settled lifestyle. As it turned out, I had a beautiful home and situation waiting for me in Eugene upon my return, but I had a very hard time settling into it: I had established a fierce independence in being alone on the road for so long, and greatly struggled with the necessary compromises of a relationship; after the initial immediate pleasure of having consistent access to a kitchen, shower, and a roof over my head wore off, my life started feeling profoundly sedentary and muted (and, in retrospect, I really don't think it was); I've struggled through the letdown and depression that almost certainly and inevitably follow such an extraordinary experience. By the end of my trip, I craved reliability and ritual; how quickly that reality started feeling mundane and predictable. I've spent a substantial portion of the last six months traveling all around the Northwest, but it's never the same; an unfortunate consequence of car travel for me is how much the travel can only be about the destination, and never about the journey or process. I love spending time with my family and friends, to be sure, but in all the ways that bicycle travel is rewarding to me, my recent automobile-assisted sporadic and fleeting presence in any one given location has only led me to a more fractured existence. All of my most memorable experiences in the last six months have been found in stillness, in presence of moment, in awareness, but little of my time has actually been spent nurturing those moments. Even now, I have yet to allow myself to settle into the home that I so dearly wanted, and I still don't quite understand why.

But. There've been wonderful aspects of the winter, as well: lots of new music opportunities and involvement with bands (big shout out to my Crunchy Beets!), knee-quaking love, new friends, lots of time with family, and, perhaps most importantly, a concrete and ever-evolving plan for the future, which places more school (what else?) on my near horizon. It's an exciting time, rife with possibilities, as only possibilities can be.

As it stands now, I am positively champing at the bit for this trip to begin. I've spent the last two weeks solidly working at making this be able to happen, and now all that stands between me and the open road is a (hopefully) restful night's sleep.

The storm before the calm.

It's kind of funny how ill-prepared I feel for this trip, and yet how thoroughly unworried I am about any of it: I haven't so much as ridden a block on a bicycle in well over a month; I've put on more than a couple of winter pounds around the ol' midriff (I prefer to think of it as "increasing my dowry"); the daunting likelihood of rain and snow in the mountains; hell, even my socks are all full of holes. But as I packed my saddlebags tonight, an overwhelming sense of joy permeated my thoughts; I'm ready for this again. Now more than ever, the sense of peace, tranquility, and opportunity for introspection that I know awaits me out there will be thoroughly welcomed into my life, nay, embraced. So once more unto the breach, my friends, once more. In peace there's nothing so becomes a man as modest stillness and humility.

[Editor's note: I've embedded the map of my previous trip in this post, for the sake of posterity and continuity; obviously, as a new trip unfolds, a new map is warranted.]



View Eugene to Boston in a larger map