Sunday, 6 July: Tandem TT championship, Peoria: Really windy. Gold medal (I think we were racing mixed open). Got a ride to Springfield, then rode out past Blue River. Not nearly as much traffic as I expected on the McKenzie Highway at the end of the holiday weekend. 94 miles for the day, racing tandem and touring on my single bike.
Monday, 7 July: I started with the Aufderheide Scenic Byway from Blue River to Oakridge. It is truly scenic and there are hardly any cars. The climbing was steep at first (I was fearing 30 miles of it), but not so bad after Cougar Reservoir. The rhododendrons at the top (is it a pass?) were in full bloom. Great descent. Lunch in Oakridge at mile 66 for the day. Then over Willamette Pass: 28 miles of climbing, 4000? feet of elevation. I don’t need to climb on a highway again for a long time. After the disappointing 2-mile descent, I got more water at a campground at Odell Lake and coke at the Crescent Lake Junction. At mile 108, I turned onto the Cascade Lakes Highway, which goes to Bend. 40 miles later (yeah, mile 148) I was still 30 miles from Bend and it was 7:15 and I was getting tired and had all the climbing over Mt. Bachelor left. I hitchhiked, another (scary) first for me. Luckily, the only real excitement was coming within 20 feet of getting nailed by falling rocks near the top of Willamette Pass. 152 miles for the day. With my backpack. Note to self: do a lot more research before embarking on cross-state bicycle travel.
Tuesday, 8 July. For a couple of hours in the morning, I had a non-cycling vacation. I went to the library in Bend to weed the spam and chat out of my email inbox (maybe that’s not really “vacation”) and found a yarn shop (both locations thankfully air conditioned). And then it was off to report for my duties for the Cascade Cycling Classic with the Veloforma women’s team.
Wednesday through Sunday are a blur. It was a fantastic experience to support 7 strong, positive women and to see almost all of them finish really, really well at an epic, arduous race. I did not have time to miss email access (although I did manage to make 3 hats!). I found a café with fantastic scones and indulged there or elsewhere every morning for 10 minutes of quiet. I rode my bike just a few times (twice on the TT course, twice on parts of the circuit race course). There were lots of friends in Bend that I did not get to see this time, but I made new ones.
Happy Bastille Day!
Monday, 7 July: I started with the Aufderheide Scenic Byway from Blue River to Oakridge. It is truly scenic and there are hardly any cars. The climbing was steep at first (I was fearing 30 miles of it), but not so bad after Cougar Reservoir. The rhododendrons at the top (is it a pass?) were in full bloom. Great descent. Lunch in Oakridge at mile 66 for the day. Then over Willamette Pass: 28 miles of climbing, 4000? feet of elevation. I don’t need to climb on a highway again for a long time. After the disappointing 2-mile descent, I got more water at a campground at Odell Lake and coke at the Crescent Lake Junction. At mile 108, I turned onto the Cascade Lakes Highway, which goes to Bend. 40 miles later (yeah, mile 148) I was still 30 miles from Bend and it was 7:15 and I was getting tired and had all the climbing over Mt. Bachelor left. I hitchhiked, another (scary) first for me. Luckily, the only real excitement was coming within 20 feet of getting nailed by falling rocks near the top of Willamette Pass. 152 miles for the day. With my backpack. Note to self: do a lot more research before embarking on cross-state bicycle travel.Tuesday, 8 July. For a couple of hours in the morning, I had a non-cycling vacation. I went to the library in Bend to weed the spam and chat out of my email inbox (maybe that’s not really “vacation”) and found a yarn shop (both locations thankfully air conditioned). And then it was off to report for my duties for the Cascade Cycling Classic with the Veloforma women’s team.
Wednesday through Sunday are a blur. It was a fantastic experience to support 7 strong, positive women and to see almost all of them finish really, really well at an epic, arduous race. I did not have time to miss email access (although I did manage to make 3 hats!). I found a café with fantastic scones and indulged there or elsewhere every morning for 10 minutes of quiet. I rode my bike just a few times (twice on the TT course, twice on parts of the circuit race course). There were lots of friends in Bend that I did not get to see this time, but I made new ones.
Happy Bastille Day!
No comments:
Post a Comment