Well, the rain on the coast stopped on Sunday morning and we were able to hit the road again. During our visit at the Proposal Rock Inn in Neskowin we met up with Pat Graham, a cyclist going on the TransAmerica Trail as far as Wyoming, where he's headed home to Cheyenne. We invited him to ride with us and so far he hasn't tired of the Ryan brothers and their witty banter.
We left Neskowin and had a few miles of nice, quiet road heading up the hills to the Coastal Range. During that climb, Monkey decided he had enough and bailed out of his home in my front bag. I didn't discover this for a while, so we had to give up some of our hard-won climb and had to go back to find him. Luckily, being such a quiet road we found him and bound him to Cow with my Velcro wrap, which has come in handy on this trip.
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Monkey Bailed Out
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Strapped to the more obedient Cow
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The remainder of the day was spent on very, very busy roads with loads of trucks and RVs. From what we hear they will be with us through most of Oregon, and so far that's been true. We covered 81 miles yesterday, making it into Corvallis, home to the Oregon State Beavers. We found an inexpensive stay at the Rodeway Inn and found a nice brew-pub that was serving a limited number of masked diners. After a nice dinner we retired to our luxurious accommodations and watch Lance Armstrong lie a little more on ESPN and went to bed.
Monday morning and we started off with a McBreakfast, dining in their parking lot, and were on our way again. We were now in the Willamette Valley, and it was surprisingly flat, and we made really good time this morning, headed toward Coburn, Oregon. It seems that the entire valley engages in growing 2 things, trees and grass. They have tree farms and grass seed farms everywhere along our route.
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Fueling up for Day #3
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Unfortunately I found that I had lost a screw on my cleats, making it almost impossible to extract myself, so we did a short detour into Eugene to find a bike shop. Most of them were closed on Monday, so we headed to the Eugene REI, which had a bike shop attached. Unfortunately they were only open for online pickups, so we called to see if they could accommodate our request for 2 cleat screws, which they did after some prompting. A key gain from this exchange was a recommendation for lunch at Burrito Girl, a food trailer located down the street. This was so nice, we ordered twice. A Gyro for lunch, and a burrito to go for our trip, since we didn't know what laid ahead.
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Thanks Burrito Girl
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Eugene was really nice and the route through town took us on bicycle paths all the way through the city, depositing us east of town and closer to our destination. Unfortunately that destination was more roads with logging trucks, cars, and lots of RVs. We are getting used to this situation and negotiated this well, but all of the noise and vibration is certainly not a relaxing event. Just about the time my legs, and especially my butt, were really ready to quit, after about 82 miles, we found the Eagle Rock Lodge, one of the options along the route. The place is beautiful, quiet, and backs up to the McKenzie River. Robert and Nancy, the proprietors, welcomed us with brownies, a glass of wine, and more importantly, a room. We were sold.
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A glass of wine after a hard-fought 82 miles
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Our path now heads into the Cascades and towards the McKenzie Pass, where we'll cross the mountain tomorrow. Actually, the McKenzie Pass will be closed until July so we have to take another pass, adding another 20 miles of uphill travel. Lodging will likely be a camp somewhere along the way to Sisters, Oregon. That's for tomorrow, though. After all, tomorrow is another day...
A reminder, in case you are feeling charitable: we have teamed up with World Bicycle Relief, a great charity the builds and donates bicycles to very worthy people. If you are so inclined, think about donating to our team at
World Bicycle Relief
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