Day 63: Portland -- The End is Nigh.

Walla Walla, WA to Portland, OR

Today we drove from Walla Walla to Portland and met up with Joy, a friend of mine from high school. It was great to see her!

The ride in was absolutely beautiful. The Columbia River Gorge was really stunning, but it was windy enough for the river to have windsurfers out and windmills churning, and it was also raining. We were happy to enjoy the sights from a car today. :)

We also went to go see Harry Potter! It was great, and I might want to go see it again before it leaves theaters.

Tomorrow I want to give Dean the Portland tour as best I can (I've only been here once, myself). That means Powell's Books, Multnomah Falls, food trucks, and Alberta St. I'm sure Dean could spend the whole day at Powell's. Possibly me, too.

After that, it's on to the shore! For now, we are exhausted. Zzzzzz....

Day 62: Sweet, Sweet Onions

Walla Walla, WA

Did you know that Walla Walla is the sweet onion capital of the country? I didn't, but I do now! Their baseball team is the Walla Walla Sweets. Today we went to the annual Sweet Onion Festival, and had sweet onion sausages. We wanted bloomin' onions, but they were sold out when we got there.

We had a good time at the festival, enjoyed some Walla Walla wine -- apparently this is quite the wine country, checked out the town, and, of course, did some laundry. Woot! We have reserved a rental car to take us to Portland tomorrow, and we'll bike to the coast from there.

We are both ready, in some ways, for the trip to be over, and we will also really miss the trip when it's over. But we've ridden through harsh winds, we've ridden in the rain, we've ridden over mountains, we've ridden in sun hot enough to give me heat rash, we've forded streams with no bridges, we've crossed many a closed road, and we've ridden through 100 miles of straight wilderness. In short, we've done this trip. I do want to ride to Seaside from Portland and dip our bikes in the ocean. But we're pretty ready to head home, get clean, take a break.

Tomorrow we head for Portland! We're almost there. We should be home in a week or so.

Day 61: King of the Ladybugs and Queen Bee

Dayton, WA to Walla Walla, WA

Stats!
Miles biked today: 30.2
Total miles biked on trip so far: 2173.2
Max speed: 32.0 mph
# of ladybugs that landed on Dean: at least 6
# of bees in my bonnet (er, helmet): 1
# of steep hills climbed unexpectedly: 5
# of new species spotted: 1 (camel!)

This morning we woke up in our wonderful, fancy hotel room and decided to take a rest day. The hotel where we were staying must have been some kind of historic building -- it had high ceilings and crown molding everywhere, and the windows were huge, with these great wooden blinds. I really loved it.

After deciding to take a rest day, we took our sweet time getting up, but made it just in time for continental breakfast. It was then that we learned that the hotel was completely booked for tonight, so we couldn't stay.

On to Walla Walla!

So we ended up with a late start, but it wasn't a huge deal since we were only going 30 miles. It was another one of those either 30 miles or 90 miles but nothing in between days, and given the choice, we'll almost always choose the shorter day. Also, there was one sizable climb about 10 miles in, but after that the elevation map promised a long, slow descent into Walla Walla.

We were feeling pretty wiped from yesterday's ride, energy-wise, but the first 10 miles were flat. When we hit the big hill, I couldn't do it. My quads were done. No more! So we changed into our regular shoes and walked up the whole thing.

After that, we had about 5 miles of the promised downhill, before -- WHAT'S THIS?? -- another steep hill where there should have been none. I double checked the map. We were definitely on the right route. So we just climbed it. Another brief downhill. Another steep climb. Another downhill. Another climb. And so on. Overall, we lost elevation, just like the map said we would, but it only shows "significant" elevation changes so you can plan for them. My quads thought all the climbs were significant today, but at least we didn't have to walk again.

Every time we stopped, a ladybug would land on Dean and hang out awhile. There were tons of them around on the whole ride today. I'm not sure why. And they weren't interested in me at all, but they were swarming Dean. Maybe his yellow jersey looked like a flower they like? One even hitched a ride on Dean's forearm for several miles.

My only encounter with insects today happened just around lunchtime. We were riding along and I felt something land on my helmet. I felt around, worried that it might have been a gift from a bird passing overhead, but I couldn't feel anything there. I forgot about it, and we went into a cafe for lunch. I took off my helmet, we ordered lunch, I got my soda, etc. I brushed back my hair, just as you might do anytime for no reason at all, and a nearly-dead bee fell onto my lap. I guess that's what had fallen on my head earlier. Naturally, I screamed, thinking it was still full of vim and vigor, and called quite a bit of attention to myself. As if we don't attract enough attention with our ridiculous outfits. Oh, well.

We eventually made it to Walla Walla, which seems like a cool town. I got my bike fixed up, as was sorely needed. But I think we are going to do another hop-skip-jump to Portland via train or rental car. Nothing's decided for sure. The next stretch is light on services and towns (I don't fancy another stretch of cold Boyardee dinners), and heavy on what the map calls "fierce wind out of the west." No good. Plus, it's supposed to rain here for the next few days. In Washington state! Who'd have guessed?

Tomorrow we are taking a rest day for laundry and to figure out what we'll do next.

I also forgot to mention yesterday that, as we were making the descent into Dayton and the sun was just down, the ride was really breathtaking. The full moon was out, the skies were purple, and the rolling hills were really green. If you saw it in a painting, you'd think it was overdone and unrealistic. But it was spectacular! So, something good came out of that fiasco.

We'll keep you updated tomorrow on what our plans are. For now, sleep!

Day 60: Bad Hills + Bad Wind + Bad Tire + Bad Decisions = BAD DAY

Lewiston, ID to Dayton, WA

Stats!
Miles biked today: 69.3 long, difficult miles
Total miles biked on trip: 2143.0
Max speed: 31.0 mph
# of hours we rode today: 12

Today I woke up feeling a little bit sick, and the weather was dreary. Dean suggested taking another rest day, but I said we'd have to climb that last mountain sometime, so it might as well be today. I had a bagel to try to settle my stomach, and off we rode.

Because we knew it was a long way to our lunch stop, and up a mountain at that, we stopped at the grocery store to pick up some snacks and gatorade for the day. It was a good idea.

The first 10 miles were great, and beautiful. We rode alongside the Snake River. It was a gray day, but you could still see the hills reflected in the water.

We soon hit Alpowa mountain, however, and things turned south. It wasn't a particularly hard climb, in terms of how steep it was -- no worse than Lolo, anyway -- but I was still feeling a little sick, and it made the climb very challenging for me. And, in fairness, we started at about 500 ft. and climbed to about 2800 ft., so it was a pretty tough ride. We had to stop and rest a lot and I got dizzy a few times. We walked some of it. It was so hard that we discussed stopping for the day at Pomeroy, the town where we planned to have lunch.

We finally climbed the mountain, and Pomeroy was about 9 miles away. Those 9 miles were pretty great, after an arduous ride up, but it was very windy, which slowed down our otherwise gleeful descent. The clouds broke up, too, and the sun came out.

In Pomeroy, we stopped at the first place we saw to eat, and got a lot of food (as per usual). We talked about whether or not to stop there, and looked at the map. It was mostly downhill or flat for most of the rest of the way, except for another pretty big climb (about 1,000 ft.) right before Dayton. There were no towns in between. We decided to go for it.

As soon as we got on the road, we noticed that the wind had gotten worse. Much worse. But it was still mostly downhill, and we just pedalled through it. The wind got so bad that we had to stop for a break a few miles out of Pomeroy -- it's exhausting to fight the wind! Dean checked his phone and saw that it was after 4 p.m. already!! I was shocked, thinking it would be around 1 p.m. We took a long time on that mountain!

Once again we discussed staying in Pomeroy. We could just turn back, get a motel, and be done with the day. We checked the weather and saw that winds would be light tomorrow. It was already close to our normal quitting time. But I could see in Dean's eyes (or thought I could) that he wanted to press on, and I really didn't want to go 4 miles back up the hill to Pomeroy, so I said I thought we should keep going.

TERRIBLE DECISION!!

The wind didn't calm down for the entire flat/downhill portion, so we never got a break. We had to fight for every inch. There wasn't much shoulder, either, and we had a few close calls with cars.

We were hungry and tired, and we ate our entire package of Pepperidge Farm cookies and drank most of our gatorade. Not rationing = terrible decision #2.

The long ascent at the end of our trip started earlier than we expected (based on our elevation maps). We went up and up and up and up. Once again, I needed a lot of breaks and to walk. Dean could have biked the whole thing faster and with no breaks at all, but he was super patient with me, and I really appreciated it!

We both were having problems rationing our water, and came close to running completely out a few times. I think we were both thirsty a lot throughout the day, but we didn't want to drink our fill and have nothing left. We were, after all, already out of cookies to keep our sugar (and mood) up.

Just as the sun was setting, my tire went flat. This was my first flat of the trip. Of course it happened today, when we had less than 10 miles left after a hard slog. Oh, well. Dean fixed the flat for me, but it took a really long time. He's getting to be a pro at fixing his own flats, and can do it really quickly, but my tires proved to be more of a challenge. I can't change a flat to save my life -- it requires way too much physical strength -- so I was grateful he was there to help.

While Dean was fixing the flat, the sun really started to sink fast. We had a decent break while the tube was being changed, and it was dark and we were tired and grouchy, and I just became determined to get to Dayton as fast as I could. I put everything I had into it, and didn't stop once from the time of the flat until we reached the (very fancy) hotel.

This was especially challenging because we could see the top of the big hill from the flat-changing site, and were anxious to get over it and make the descent into town, a few miles down. Psych! We had about half a mile of downhill, followed by an even steeper uphill to a new peak. Oh, LORDY.

But I really wanted to just *get there*, and Dean did too and I wanted to stop slowing him down so much, so we powered through to Dayton with our headlights now on because it got so dark. It was also FREEZING on that downhill! But we made it to town, stopped at the first hotel we saw (fancy, as I previously mentioned, so that's nice), and found the only place still open and serving food.

We are now well fed, have a roof over our heads, and are completely exhausted. I think we might actually take a rest day tomorrow, just to recover from this one rough day.