Stage 1, Oregon to Idaho

You may notice the new link which shows the whole trip so far, it has replaced the other link as it gives more options and I think does a much better job. If you are so short of a life that you want to know where I am on an hourly basis feel free to stalk me there.

First 8 days:

Kilometres: 982

Meters climbed: 12675

Hamburgers eaten: 6

Ice creams swallowed whole: 7

Piss taken out of the Dutch: huge

After 3 days of riding are done I'm was back in the routine of a tour like this. The days are as long as you want to make them, dictated by how hard you ride the bike. 

Day one from Astoria where we had dipped our wheels in the Pacific we rode to St Helens it's a small town about 10 kms from the site of the St Helen's volcano. 

Bit over the top !!

Day two we rode through Portland along the canal / river and saw lots of house boats. Some of these are 3 levels, they all have a garage door on the river side  where they store their boat. We saw a whole suburb of them on one part of the river.  8 houses wide by 4 deep just like streets. 

We rode to Welches which is about half way up Mt Hood so the day finished with a bit of a climb. Every day we have been told that it would be wet BUT still no rain yeeha. The radar had us in a huge storm yesterday evening but it cleared up over night and was fine the next morning.

 

Early start to day 3 as we had to ride down the road for a kilometre for breakfast. I'm still adjusting to eating plastic food for breakfast. Plastic plates, knives, spoons straws and the food is kind of plastic in the mornings as well. There is lots of it though so I'm not complaining. 

We climbed for the first 19 kms and at the top it was 4c and a wet cold wind. The view of Mt Hood is incredible - so I'm told, but it was covered in mist and cloud so I never actually sighted it. The descent on the back was brilliant, the road was so smooth and we had a tail / crosswind  - beautiful. We rode 112kms in total with about 1800m of climbing and ended in a resort in a town called Warm Springs. It's on an Indian reservation called Kah-nee-ta the tribe is called The Warm Springs Tribe, yeah really. The difference in terrain in one days riding is amazing. This morning we rode through huge green forests and it now looks like we are in cowboy country. 

Day four was just 98 kms and I rode with a Dutchman who is very strong, he does not call out the crap on the road when he is doing a turn. I asked him ton call it and he replied " No I don't do that stuff" WTF  ??  Is was a drag across a dry empty bit of country so we flogged along. Everyone else had an active rest day as the following day was 186 kms amd you know how yanks like to talk up their "Century" rides. We overnighted in Prineville, a tiny town which I bet you have never heard of. It's the town where Facebook and Apple run their data servers. 

In Prineville I came across this store.

WTF is a Growler fill Station anyway ??

Day Five was a 186 kms F'ing shocker I woke with very low sugar levels. My room mate later spoke of my " 1000 mile vacant stare" ( MH you know what he means  !! ) it was just raining as we left and I was well prepared with a light gillet NOT.  It rained for the first 50 kms and we got to the top of the first climb. It was freezing and it was zero degrees.  !! . I was so cold I had to stop on the way down as I was shaking so much, I thought I was going to crash for sure. The second climb warmed me up a bit and I was disappointed when I got to the top. (Most unlike me. ) it continued raining every F'ing inch of the ride to the town of John Day. If you look at the trip so far link you will also notice I also seemed to go very straight. It appears the Spot device I use to track the ride ran out of battery and also on that day my Garmin shut down. Normally a disaster as you need to know your distances to navigate your way and make the route., but that day it did not matter as the directions were:

1 Turn left out of the Best Western Hotel..

2. Turn left into the next Best Western Hotel. 

If you get lost on that day you are plain dumb. 

Next Six was 133 kms to Baker City. As spectacular day as you could ask for. Clear skies light head wind but not an issue. Beautiful climbs and a long steady descent to town. 

Day 7 we rode down hill to Ontario Oregon. It was brilliant fun, 100 kms down hill then 33 kms flat. Sun shining and a high speed pace line for the last 30. 

Day Eight was 102 kms to Boise and into the state of Idaho.

The headwind was quite strong in the morning but eased by about 10am. We arrived in town and stopped in a great bar/restaurant, we had all been asked to all wear our America by Bicycle riding tops so made quite a sight in the restaurant. 

Last night one of the Canadians was telling a story in a normal voice. One of the Americans said in a loud voice "Speak louder" he replied "No I'm not an American you listen up when I talk" - had a quiet giggle to myself. 

Speaking my language here.

Bike boxes US style. Great idea too as they are very strong. 

Don't see this sign too often on my rides back home.

Beautiful road and views, top of a climb it looks a bit like Switzerland.

Only coffee available in this town

Cleanliness Phobic America,

I have seen notices in the hotels saying the room is Ultra cleaned, super ultra cleaned, and super ultra clean and totally sanitised. 

Finally, check out the description of the fillings of this burger 

Stage two starts tomorrow, we have 5 new riders and we have dropped off 3. Have to start learning names again.