Plotting the Summer starts the previous December- Glacier; Going to the Sun Highway

Riding the Going to the Sun Highway has been on my bucket list for many years. I wanted to hit it when I went down the Great Divide , but that was a missed opportunity. When I mentioned this to my partner, he agreed to go with me. My partner is a good cyclist, but not hardcore. The fact that he's interested in doing this truly thrills me.

I started the process by calling Glacier Cyclery in Whitefish, Montana. One of the employees, Vanessa, emailed me back with a lot of information. She suggested that I make sure I have bike rental reservations finished by mid-March. When I had the dates all confirmed and the airplane tickets, I called Glacier Cyclery. I actually got to speak to Vanessa, and she suggested altering my plans. My plan had been to start up as early as possible, believing that everybody had to be off the road by 11 o'clock and there were no other chances to go up. Vanessa noted that leaving early in the morning, it is cold and there's a lot of traffic that makes the trip up quite stressful. Adding to that stress is the time factor, requiring cyclists to be at the top before 11 o'clock. Vanessa also informed me that after 4 o'clock cyclists are allowed again on the road. She noted that it's a fabulous time to go up since the sun doesn't go down until 9:30 at night. She also stated that at 4 o'clock most of the traffic is coming down, and all the people who were rushing to go up to start hikes in the morning are gone. There was an added bonus on top of that; the alpine glow lends a beautiful hue to views on the way back home. We don't have to mention that I do not work for Glacier Cyclery... I was truly impressed by her knowledge of that particular road, and that she's done it several times. The bike rental situation is quite good, especially after I asked her for her advice in terms of timing. Also the rates are quite reasonable and they're going to rent us a bike rack for our rental car. I have had positive dealings with Glacier Cyclery previously, when I was on The Great Divide Route. They took a phone order while we were far away and very remote, for one of my companions who had panniers that failed. The panniers were waiting when we arrived in Whitefish, MT at Glacier Cyclery.

I am more excited to go than ever...

The Snowstorm Challenge

Buffalo had quite a little snowstorm recently.  Four people were astonished I rode the whole 3 miles to work regardless of the forecast and two more offered me a ride home, but slow and steady makes the grade.  For those out there contemplating riding in moderate snow, there are a few things to consider.
Studded tires are a waste in anything but ice and even then they are not 100% helpful.  You still go down on the ice, but since you slide, there is no road rash and fewer bruises.  You can't go nearly so fast, so even if you strike something, it is not a big deal.  The most important things are to not take chances turning in front of cars or being on streets where if you go down you might be hit by a passing car. The cars take a long to stop and on ice, they don't swerve very well.

That is a 15lb bag of cat food on the back rack for traction.  Just kidding about the traction.

Impromptu Minneapolis

6:45pm Minneapolis airport: Delta airlines asks for volunteers to lay over 24 hours, hotel and meals included, $400 travel voucher.
7:15- I'm all set and rescheduled for tomorrow, same bat time, same bat place.
24 hours in Bicycling Magazine's #1 ranked bike friendly city, and the whole day sponsored by Delta.
At the Mall of America Ramada hotel (which treated me just as well as if I had paid for the room), I used their public, very fast computer to look for cycling info and print 3 pages (no charge).
Results: a whole listing of shops renting bikes, info on obtaining path maps and countless links to further info.
Picked one close to the Hiawatha light rail.
9/3 6:00am woke, showered, packed, checked out, asked to leave my duffle, used the Delta meal vouchers for breakfast and lunch (Ramada packed me a box lunch) and walked the short distance to Mall of America.






7:30 jumped off at Lake to walk a quick 1 mile to Freewheel Bike Shop.





Amazing. They rent really nice carbon Treks- $50.
Problem- they have to put a hold on your credit card for the value of the bike. $1,400. Several years ago I asked my CC company to reduce my credit limit to avoid cc fraud. I am at that limit (set it pretty low, didn't I- thought I was sooooo smart). Called CC company- could they please up my limit? BUT OF COURSE! What a stupid question.
Crash couse on using a CO2 cartridge to inflate presta tubes. All new to me. No toe clips. At least I had a helmet and mirror. How embarrassing, I had to go back to the shop to ask how to shift.  Such an old school girl, with her bar end shifters, toe clips and steel framed bike.






Followed the Greenway Trail until I saw a likely candidate for a riding partner. Out for several hours, avg 17- 22 mph. Sounded plausible. Then he was joined by 3 others. Really lean guys. It should have flashed a warning. Didn't. First half, about 15 miles, well within my speed limits. Second half, not so much. On two occasions at least, they waited for me. No computer, so I have no idea how fast, but I would guess well over 20 on the flat. After about 5 miles they slowed down again, but a little off, I had to draft to keep up then. This group... maybe part of a triathlon team out of Urban Tri shop. They could have and probably should have kicked my Buffalo butt and dropped me. But kindness ruled. So sweet. I know, I know. But I really enjoyed myself.






After they finished, I kept going to cross the Mississippi into St. Paul, then back into Minneapolis, around "The Lakes" and back to the bike shop. I joined forces with a rider going the same way who knew the route. Such a pleasure. He went a more manageable pace. Kudos to the cycling community of Minneapolis. Very welcoming. I think I did 45-50 miles, but am guessing.
Compare Portland to Minneapolis: apples to oranges. One is more fabulous for recreational, the other maybe for all around commuting. Maybe. Both nice. What says you? 6 months in Portland, 6 months in Minneapolis. Would you like to guess which 6 months would belong to Minneapolis?
Full light rail train cars. On a Saturday.  And the trains had bike hooks. The amazement never ends.




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Temp drop

This past Saturday I rode from Buffalo to Wilson on the shore of Lake Ontario. Leaving Buffalo, the temperature was cool and expected to rise to 80. In Wilson, 40 miles away, the temp never topped 68. Brrrr. On the way, I performed my smallest rescue yet. Any smaller and I would have thought it a rock.



That is my bracelet encompassing this tiny turtle. I passed it by, sighed and went back for it.

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Portland for 5 days before heading home

I spent 2 days driving around with my whole family, then 3 more days just with my daughter. Portland would be such a fabulous place to live, if not for the weather and lack of jobs.
What makes Portland so fabulous? The whole bike culture. In Buffalo, if you needed to make a left turn, you would wait until traffic cleared or proceed to an intersection, then use the light to make your left. In Portland, you stick your arm out to signal your intention to turn left from the bike lane on the right. Even if there are three lanes of traffic going one way behind you, they all stop so you can pass in front of them. Story #2: Five of us with bicycles needed to get on a 3 car train, the stop after the location of the Italian Festival at 5:30 at night (no comments on the choice of stops). We broke into 3 groups to get into separate cars. I pulled forward into the car with my bike and realized my daughter and I were not going to make it: too many people. As I looked backwards to begin backing out, then forward again, the whole mass of people had parted to let us get to the hooks in the train to hang our bikes. Just like that. When we got to our destination, all 5 of us had experienced the same phenomenon. It is not that every driver and pedestrian was fabulous, but that the majority were. It made Buffalo pale in comparison.
Here are some pictures of the special bike boxes to protect bikes locked in one place for an extended time (one rents most of them):
Here is my Bike Friday leaning against a rental bike box. This one was at a park and ride lot. I suspect you can leave your bike there, then take your car or the train the rest of the way home.
This one is a hinged device, which swings down onto your bike and "skewers" your diamond frame and each wheel. It locks the main components, but is really only good for a day, not an overnight.












This cover is hinged and drops down over your whole bike, then locks into position.

Manzanita to Astoria, OR 46 miles

Last morning of packing up.














There was a cyclist with a BOB trailer modified to carry his surf board.






Left with everyone: Janelle, Bill, Sara, Ted, Jamie and Heidi with the special addition of Marissa, whom we met at the campground last night. Marissa was doing a loop from Portland (a Lewis and Clark student) to Tamarook to Astoria and back to Portland. She was a new cycle tourist using borrowed equipment and discovering that her bike did not really have adequate gearing for touring. She was doing phenominally well considering.







We lost Sara while taking a shortcut. Sara's shortcut cut off more than ours, so while we waited for her, she was ahead of us with Ted and Janelle, who had missed the shortcut entirely.
Silver Lining: Bill and Heidi got to get coffee while we waited and Marissa caught up!






At an overlook, we commented on all the imaginary wildlife and creatures we saw swimming in the ocean and fog, while Bill talked on the phone.





















Heidi rang Bill's bell to notify him we were ready to move on, but he didn't take her seriously, so I rang it a gazzilion times. It was very inordinately funny at the time.
This section of the route included a tunnel.






There was a button to press which lit up a warning sign to drivers that there were cyclists in the tunnel, but fortunately no cars came along while we were in the tunnel. I don't know if Marissa shared the same luck. She doesn't have to be in Astoria until Friday, while we are due in by today at 3pm.
Along a really busy section of 101, Jamie said her knee really hurt and asked to stop. So we did. Right there. To multi-task we pulled out lunch stuff. This also gave Marissa a chance to catch up. She sat on the road with us against the guard rail and ate an apple, then proceded to toss the core behind her. What are the odds a car would be coming up the on-ramp that happened to be on the other side of the guardrail?









A southbound Pacific Coast cyclist stopped and commented on our lovely choice of lunch stops and it turned out he, Jamie and Heidi have mutual friends.




We decided to regroup in Seaside with Janelle, Ted and Sara. While trying to find each other, Janelle mistakingly thought we were in Astoria, because she was reading a text from her husband and thought it was from me. This led to some funny conversation as we tried to sort out who was where. Seaside's boardwalk proved a challenge to negotiate, given all the bodies, dogs and small children darting out. It was amazingly busy, considering it was quite cool and foggy.
When we moved back to the streets we tried to take the lane since traffic was moving so slowly, but it was difficult to hold nine cyclists together. We held together until the last big hill identified on the map, when we divided into 2 groups.
The directions included things like this: At water treatment facility, continue straight across private road. I did manage to take the correct roads and was followed by Janelle, Ted and Marissa for most of the way. Bill, Heidi, Sara and jamie went the wrong way, but ended up in the right place anyways. They asked to regroup in a certain place, but since they were not on the route, we missed them. A little comedy of errors.
Finally, we were able to regroup at the Astoria City border. Our little Peleton worked its way toward the finish line, but one of the roads we were supposed to take was barricaded for the first 50 feet. No Problem. We just detoured through a parking lot to get around it. A DQ parking lot. NO WE ARE NOT STOPPING, EVEN IF WE HAVE GONE 30 MILES!!! Next up? A really steep hill. Oh, cruel fate. One of the steepest hills on the route. Two of us had to walk it. Fortunately it was pretty short. Up and around, twist and turn, through center of the city and... Violà, the Maritime Museum!
None of our peeps were there, but a tourist recognized what must be an important moment in history and took several pictures of the group, promising to email them to Jamie and me.
Bob, Dwight, Elliott, Rachel and Aaron showed up shortly and then there was a giant photo op.








It didn't seem right that Bill had no flats this trip, so I thought I might fix that.









Ted, Janelle and Bill ran off to ship their bikes, we said goodbye to Marissa and everyone else made for the restaurant, were we made merry until quite late and drank champagne, compliments of my parents.








Last order of business was to drive Jamie back to Bay City to retrieve Sara's car. It was fun to drive back part of the route.
What an exceptional adventure. This was the best group ever and we were very lucky to have such great support from our families. I will miss you all until we hopefully meet again.
Thank you.








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Pacific City to Manzanita, OR 67 miles

We rode together, conquering some serious hills until Netarts, where we parted from Ted and Janelle. They took the shorter alternate to Tillamook to get to the library with time to work on blogs, while Bill and I went to Ocean City for second breakfast.













At the restaurant we watched people flying rc planes. It was pretty much perfect weather; cloudy with no wind. I must admit that we have experienced far less wind than Heidi, Jamie and Sara seem to have experienced.
The two routes both had 2 big hills, but our route had a horrible road surface with deep potholes and dappled shade, making it difficult to see the holes. As a result, a nice potential 31mph downhill was stalled to about 15 mph for safety as we desired to remain on our bikes rather than under them.
In Tillamook we reconnected again briefly with Janelle and Ted at the library, but since they had just eaten, we decided to stay in town for lunch.
Outside the library we Met 3 pacific coast travelers, headed for Venezuala, Panama and one striving to go as far as possible by Sept 8th.
At Bay City met back up again with Ted and Janelle.


Jamie, Heidi and Sara had driven back down to finish the ride with us, though technically they finished several days ago when they made it to Florence. They still wanted to go all the way to Astoria.


We drafted for quite a while, but then lost Janelle and Ted until the Manzanita grocery. Jamie, Heidi and Sara had gone towards the campground, but Ted, Janelle, Bill and I decided a pub was in order. We rode to Nehalem campground in our own personal fogs.
The hiker biker site was far superior to former examples, including sand tent pads and multiple picnic shelters, as well as flat ground.
Last note of the night is a great quote of Heidi:
How do you tell if pasta is cooked? By how it feels when you swallow it.

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Springfield to Rickreall, OR 68

It was pretty cool in the morning. Our jackets and shirts were on and off as we froze and sweated.
We slinkied all day with Janelle and Ted, catching up, then passing or being passed.



In Corvallis we located a bakery with fabulous choices for snacks and lunch, but snacks won out. We ate pie and drinks.
Desperate for a bathroom, i was passing several before I screamed to a halt at the very last set and was too lazy to go back 100 feet to another. The one I chose was devoted to spiders. I had to reach through webbing that rivaled horror movie effects in order to open the door (which looked as though it might have been nailed shut at one time), then I had to make space for myself on the seat and relocate several spiders to take some toilet paper.
The route was actually pretty level today, which might spoil us for any future hill endeavors.
Saw another Datsun!
We hit a headwind at end of day, but survived. We ended up at the county fairgrounds and found a sign that indicated the camping was closed to the public. I voted for just integrating into the existing private campers, but Bill asked the supervisor, who said, "fine".


We helped dismantle waterfowl exhibit tents. Here Janelle, Ted and Bill move a mobile cart full of folding chairs.


The only event going on after we were finished was Dockdogs, a competition to see which dog could chase a thrown toy furthest off a dock. They had a portable dock and pool!








If there were a museum for antique playground equipment, most of their equipment would have been repressented, though it would be roped off do to safety concerns.


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Rickreall to Pacific City, OR 64 miles

The road was busy and not incredibly pleasant. We stayed on it (18 to 101) anyways, even though the route veered off, because we figured it would be shorter and less hilly.
We saw our first mileage sign for Astoria.




I don't know why we were all smiling at the top of this hill. Maybe we were all thrilled to be closing in on the coast or maybe we were all slap happy...












Dance moves?






Pacific Coast! We were told that sunny and 70 degrees was atypical for the Oregon coast, that cool and foggy was more typical and that we were lucky.









Lunch was a mix of store bought sandwiches and stuff from our panniers. It was so serene and we relected a lot on the impending end of our trip.





The group split temporarilly at Pacific City. Ted and Janelle went to the library while Bill and I went to scope out accomodations. I checked the campgrounds and Bill checked hotels. Peak vacation time: you can probaby predict what Bill found. I found the private cG full, but the county campground was almost empty. What I noticed first was the proliferation of feral domesticated rabbits.


And finally, ice cream, then pizza for dinner and a surprise photo before bed, a VW bug with a surfboard on top!