Portland to Lincoln City!

Portland to Salem: 55 miles

I composed this on my phone, my apologies for the lack of capital letters.

Portland was amazing.  The night before we left, we went for a 10pm Voo Doo Donut run.  already stuffed from the pasta dinner, i ended the night with a pretty magificent maple donut filled with cream.

i paid for it the next morning with such a stomachache.  i started the day feeling bloated and gross and grumpy, and i was super bummed to feel like that the first day riding with chad and tyler. 

then a few miles into the ride, i fell off my bike.  it wasn't as bad as my first fall, it was just at a crosswalk, trying to turn around after, having made a wrong turn.  i sat on the curb and rubbed my knees, and cried a little, mostly out of frustration with myself for not being a morning person, and not feeling well, and starting to watch myself dragging behind everyone else. 

sarah sat beside me and told me it was okay.  tyler, chad and dustin offered to help me lighten my load and they were all patient.  after a few minutes and a few deep breaths, i was ready for the road again. 

we rode south, through some smaller cities along hwy 99.  we hit our first tunnel south of oregon city.  i had read about some tunnels in the tour book, and it warned about how dangerous they could be for cyclists.  you should wait for a lull in traffic, make sure you have all your lights on and pedal fast!  so everybody stopped together and prepped.  tyler didn't have lights, so we made sure he was in the middle.  we were all a little nervous, and waited for a lull.  i was at the rear, and we went for it!

right before i rode in, i noticed a sign that said the tunnel was only 14 feet long. there was just a turn that made it look like it could have been so much longer... but we were SO ready, regardless.

we arrived at my big brother, casey's house by about 3.  my brother and his fiance, cassie are super fun.  casey is the screamer in a hardcore punk band, called fece, and his day job is as a body piercer at "that tattoo shop" in keizer.  he's big on barbequeing and being a great host and making guests feel super welcome.  cassie is chatty and bubbly and very crafty.  they make a great pair. 

it was really great to visit my nephew, bailey.  i've only been able to get to  hang out with my brother and his family over the past year that i've been jet-setting back and forth to portland.  it makes me really happy to be called "aunt aly," and hear all the things bailey wants to tell me and show me and ask me.  we'll draw pictures and make up silly songs together. 

i walked to his school with cassie to pick him up and surprised him and got a big hug.  i gave him the super-hip do-rag that randy goforth, the biker in longview had given to me.  it was a little too small for me and fit bailey perfect, and had all kinds of awesome skulls all over it.

casey is huge on barbeque, and asked what kind of meat my friends liked.  i told him they were mostly vegetarian, but were down with poultry or fish for this trip, and he went above and beyond!  he made mushroom-walnut veggieburgers from scratch.  and they were pretty much out of this world.  i might have to post the recipe for you guys.
we all had a couch to sleep on.  even with the rough start, it was a such a wonderful day.

salem to lincoln city: 60 miles

the next day we tried to wake up at about 6 or 7.   every day, i wish i was more of a morning person.  by the looks of my brother when we said goodbye, he is the same way.  

after falling off my bike again, the day before, i decided i better send some more things home.  if i can't carry my own weight,  i've got to lighten my own load.  with much dismay, i gave up the camera again.  tyler had brought a minolta from my dad, but it wasn't much lighter than my vivitar was.  i was super bummed about it.  capturing adventures on 35mm film is very special to me.  but...  if it was going to make the nect 1250 miles that much harder, than i had to make the sacrifice. Luckily, tyler has since offered to be the official tour photographer!  i also send back my kryptonite u-lock.  dustin and chad both have cable locks, and most of the time someone watches the bikes, anyways.

i started the day with a stuffy nose and a sore throat.  i started getting worried about getting sick, especially after having had an upset stomach the day before.  i started off the day kind of nervous and fearful.  we were planning on taking the 22 from salem out to the coast, but a guy in one of the bike shops said that it wasn't a great road and recommended the 20 out from corvalis, instead.  i checked it out on the odot, the oregon department of transportation's website, and it looked lie it had a good shoulder of 4' or more except for a small section further in..  i looked at a terrain map on google, which totally intimidated me.  the rest of the rides had been relatively flat, and it's all green and hilly almost 40 miles of the ride on the 22. 

we had a hard time even getting onto the 22.  the first onramp wasn't safe for cyclists.  thern we missed the second one.  then once we got over the river, there was a detour.   we stopped at a safeway so everyone could use the bathroom.  i stayed and watched the bikes, and this drunk or drug addict with a bloody eyeball approached me and started casually asking about touring and our bicycles.  tyler came out and was just looking up the route on his phone and didn't notice him.  i politely told him that he was making me uncomfortable and he apologized.  and then continued to apologize to everyone else as they came out.  he seemed pretty harmless, but it threw me off.  i started to get worried about other things.  what if there was no place to stop for water in one of these towns?  what if we didn't get any gps or cellphone reception?  what if the highway was too dangerous and somebody got hurt?

we rode on.  i took up the rear.  we had escaped the cyclops and were westbound into the unknown with our first glimpse of the coast coming up at the end of our day.
the first few miles weren't so bad.  it started with more flat farmland, which made it really difficult to find a good place to pee.  hardly even a tree or bush in sight.  
we had a little bit of headwind over some easy hills.  it sucked a little energy out of us, but we took a break by a wildlife refuge, and kept going.

after a few more of those easy rolling hills, i started to get a little more sure of myself.  oh, so these were all these hills on the terrain map? easy peasy.  i just need to learn how to gauge altitude a little better.

but shortly after, we got some pretty steady inclines.  one right after another, each one a little higher.  i was always dragging behind everyone else.  a little further with each hill.  i could see dustin's little yellow flag, waving on his way up.  and i would kick my bike into smaller and smaller gears, even spinning in the granny gear was hard.  and i'd get around a corner, and that mountain would just keep going.  i felt slow.  and tired.  and frustrated.  then too tired to even be frustrated.  i'd see the others drafting.  i was too slow to follow anyone close enough to draft. 

but, again, my friends are amazing, so they'd never let me fall too far behind.  they'll always wait.  and cheer me on and ring their bells when i catch up after a big climb.
after a few of these hills, i was getting pretty worn out, and we still had quite a ways to go.  i needed some sort of moral boost, since i was always so far behind everyone else.  it was hot, i was behind, there was a long way to go, and the closest thing i had to company were the semi trucks passing me by and dustin's flag waving at me from the distance.  so, for the first time on this trip, i got out my mp3 player.

i turned down the volume low enough that i could still hear cars coming up behind me, but loud enough to keep me going.  i picked a mix that toren made me, called "music to fall off your bike to." that section of the ride was like a dream.  music that was so familiar to me  made me  feel so nostalgic. it made me happy, and familiar rhythms and melodies kept my body moving.  if i wasn't panting so hard, i'd have sung along!  it was pretty surreal riding in such an unfamiliar place, doing such an unfamilliar, adventurous and challenging thing, listening to something that's special to you and attached to different memories.  a pink floyd song came on and i watched sarah in her yellow tank top rolling down the hills ahead of me.  bicycles, winding roads,  deep in the oregon forest.  i wouldn't have been surprised if we took off into the clouds.

i almost caught up to everyone on another incline and i got another flat tire.  i rang my bell a bunch of times, which, we've all kind of established as our "distress" bell.   lucky i caught everyboy before anyone decended.  i took off my panniers, and put my bike on it's side.  i took off the tire, and before i could even get my tire levers out, the boys were already getting to work to change it out for the spare.   it was a good opportunity for everyone to take a short breather anyway.

everything seemed okay... but when we put the tire back on  the bike, dustin noticed there was a hole in the side of the tire.  the tube was bulging out.   we checked the front tire, and the same thing was happening.  350 miles in, and my tires were thrashed.    i wish i had gotten higher quality tires.  sarah and dustin had both gotten gator skins, and hadn't had any trouble.  luckily, dustin had one spare tube.  wee put it on the front tire.  we  used the best of my two tires on the rear, and a dollar bill between the tube and the tire as a temporary patch.  the next bike shop wouldnlt be until newport.  i feel so safe with  dustin, chad, sarah, and tyler.   they're so fast and thoughtful and resourceful.        

most of the rest of the ride was downhill, until we got closer to the coast.  we got out of the forest and the sun started really beating down on us.  we started passing signs for campgrounds and the coast and i started getting antsy and exhausted.  i ran out of cliffbars and shot blocks in my jersey pockets, when i got my first whiff of the ocean.
we had made plans of making some sort of epic video of our first glimpse of the    ocean to post here on the blog.  something triumphant!  something inspiring!  but, in reality, it was pretty anticlimactic.  we were all exhausted. and turned around, looking for the campground, realizing it was another 2.5 miles further.  then i looked over and saw it between a few houses.
 
"oh.  there's the ocean." 

"yep."

and we pressed on.  we stopped at a store to get some more food for dinner.   it turns out,  even though everyone else was flying ahead of me,  we were all going through the same thing.  i had been feeling pretty sub-par, or not fit enough, or what have you, but even though they were cruising ahead of me, they were struggling through all the same hills i was.

when we got to that store, we were all totally out of it.  chad grabbed bread, hummus and an avocado.  sarah and dustin grabbed some fruit, avocados and  and hot cheetohs.  i got some nasal deongestant, acetaminophen, fruit, a snickers bar and a naked juice.

when we finally did get to the campsite, a state campground called devil's lake, it was perfect.  well kept. but still  lush and beautiful.  the bathrooms were really nice, and the showers were hot and free!

after such a long, tiring and challenging day. the first thing i wanted to do after i started to think straight again was to call toren and my dad.  i miss them.  

through the really challenging parts of these rides the main emotion that comes out on the bicycle is frusttration and exhaustion and the drive to keep going.  whenever i see sarah struggle,and i ask if she needs to stop, she just grits her teeth and says, "lets just go.  i just want to get there."  and i undertsand that. 

as soon as we get down time,  all those other emotions come flooding in.  i'll call toren and dad and complain too much and process everything we all just accomplished and at first i just feel sad and worried and drained.  but then i walk back to join everyone, and see us sitting together. getting our sleeping bags set up and cutting up cheese and salami an i feel really proud, and happy, and totally amazed.  and can't stop smiling.  
everytime i call home or write in this blog, it's so hard to try to get it all in.  what can you say in a 10 minute conversation after you've put your body through the hardest physical challenge in your whole life?  and know that you're going to do it again every day for the next 5 weeks?  how do you describe the beauty that keeps unfolding?  it's endless and green and breathtaking.  i keep looking around me and at my friends riding inf ront of me and saying to myself " this is it.  this is really my life" and " what did i get myself into."  and "i'm not ready for this."  but even if i wasn't, i still made it.  i'm proud of that.