Day 45

Mileage: 101
Total mileage: 3987

Today's ride was dominated by the looming cascades ahead, and it was beautiful! 

I woke up this morning and looked outside the little covered awning I was under to see pretty heavy rain. It was still before 7, so I rolled over and went back to sleep. No need to deal with that this early in the morning. When I opened my eyes a few minutes later it had stopped. I looked the other direction and it was still raining. I had forgotten about this particular northwest phenomenon where there will be a sharply demarcated line between rain and no rain. It used to split our back yard in half in Washington. As it was, I packed up and walked out the dry side of my awning without getting wet at all, while the other side of the park continued to get drenched.

At breakfast I ended up meeting a gentleman who actually rode the trail 39 years ago. It's fun to hear how things have barely changed. He knew the names of all the big hills I was tackling and we talked about small towns that no one would ever have heard of if it weren't for this route. I left breakfast inspired and ready to tackle my morning 2000 foot climb to the top of Ochoco Pass.

A few hours later I puffed to the top of the summit and began my descent. For some reason I've been having really bad luck with flats here in Oregon. My tires are still intact, but last night I got a big piece of metal stuck in the back tire while climbing Dixie pass (which led to a quick flat) and today some ground glass shards managed to get through my front tire, just far enough to cause a really slow leak. Over the top of the peak I found a little rest stop and flipped the bike over to swap the tubes out. Patching can wait till I'm in town. While I was working, a motorcyclist pulled up and got off to look around the little rest stop. I think his name was Jeff (or Rich, I can't keep names straight anymore) and he was riding up from Bend to see his daughter in Bozeman, Montana. I do distinctly remember his wife Katy though because she came up a few minutes later in a car and poured me two huge handfuls of ENORMOUS Oregon blueberries. They were fingerlicking good, despite the fact that my hands were covered in soot from the bike.

My ride into Prineville followed a pretty gentle downhill grade, so despite the rough surfacing of the road, I managed to make decent time. The entire time though, I was plagued by a tiny bit of irregularity in my front wheel where I had just changed the tire. It felt like it was out of round, but the rim looked great. How can a tire be out of round!? I deflated and reinflated it a few times during the ride into town and finally just decided to deal with the uneasiness for the next 20 miles. In Prineville, I stopped at a bike shop and asked the fellow working there if he knew what was up. From behind the counter he was able to tell that I just hadn't managed to get the tire bead completely tucked under the rim the whole way around. He deflated it, tugged on the tire for a few seconds and instantly fixed my problem. I learned something new about the things that can go wrong with bikes, I'd never heard of that problem before.

From Prineville I got to go north, off the main road and through O'Neil and Terrebonne, two tiny little cities. This is where things really started to get scenic! (see picture below for proof)

  

I was on the phone with a friend named Megan from Eugene, setting things up for tomorrow night, when I turned a corner and got my first glimpse of the Cascades, specifically the Three Sisters. Enormous, snow covered peaks hovering over the landscape, they were just jaw droppingly beautiful even far out on the horizon. The best part is, I was heading straight for them! 

 

 

Tonight the plan was to stay with my friend Hannah's aunt and uncle near Sisters. I had anticipated I would be there around 7 o'clock, let them know as much, and then my phone died. In true TransAmerican style, however, my route decided to go north for a while to seek out the only mountainous terrain between me and Sisters, slowing me down a fair bit. I spent the last hour positively cranking as hard as I could so that I wouldn't get there too much later than when I'd anticipated. I wasn't going too hard though to stop and take one more picture of the Cascades.

 

 

Home for the night is the luxurious accommodations of Nancy and John Stephenson. As soon as I rolled up the driveway I was bombarded with hospitality, given a room, a shower, offered a margarita, a place to dry my clothes, posh snacks and a tour of the garden. A few minutes after I got there, Hannah's other aunt and uncle Bruce (far left) and Sharon (taking the picture) arrived and I was given a map and a highlighter and asked to trace my route across the country. 

What followed was a hilarious and enjoyable evening. I absolutely stuffed myself on delicious carne asada tacos until I couldn't eat anymore, and then I got to have some ice cream. Both Nancy and John are wildlife biologists who met over an electrocuted eagle (how romantic...?) and now John does a lot of work with wolves. Bruce has hiked enormous swaths of the Pacific Crest Trail as well, so the conversation understandably lingered on the West Coast wilderness. John would brook no mention of the notion that Oregon might not be the wildest, prettiest place in the West. I think it's up in the air between Montana and Oregon, but what do I know, I've only ridden a fragment of each.

 

 

Tonight I'm sleeping in a bed!! I'm showered, warm and full of good food with a beautiful ride ahead of me tomorrow. I'm hoping to get up a little early, crush through the Cascades and get to Eugene by tomorrow afternoon if that's possible. But right now I'm just looking forward to the most comfortable night's sleep in a long time. G'night!