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| Headed out from Pullman. Beautiful Wheat Hills! |
Our first day on the road!
As we loaded our panniers onto bikes at the RV Park in Pullman, I got nervous and scared that I wouldn't be able to handle my bike on the road. I worried about my hands, I worried about my knees, I worried I wasn't strong enough. I worried my feet would get stuck in my clips and I'd crash. And I looked at Jay, giddy as a kid in a toy store with unlimited funds. Yeah, this is going to be fun! I straddled my bike and started, swallowing my fears.
We peddled to Old European Restaurant, recommended as a great breakfast spot. This included an insane hill, which I walked up. Later on, I discovered we could ride a flat bike path around the hill... After filling up at this oh so cheerful restaurant that specializes in all types of European breakfast cakes, we headed west.
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| Jay ready to go, in front of the Old European Restaurant. |
Rolling through the hills of wheat in various states of cultivation, Jay and I kept saying, "Wow! This is beautiful!" No matter how many times we said it, we meant it. I'll wax poetic about the hills on another post. Traffic was sparse, and I gradually started to feel more comfortable with my loaded bike. I knew we had 18 miles to the first rest area, the Wawawai Park on the Snake River. What I wasn't prepared for was the downhill that began at about mile 13. This was 5 miles of steep descent. At the beginning, I was in awe of the purple flowers blanketing the hills around the gorge the road followed as the land rose in steep slopes on both sides.
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| Stop to admire scenery, palouse hills on Wawawai Rd. |
Jay flew down ahead, like he knew what he was doing. Not knowing the road or what to expect (pot holes? animals? stop signs? vehicles? sharp turns?) I wanted to have reasonable enough speed to control my bike in case of emergencies. This deemed very difficult--between my weak hands and the heavy bike, good luck! I wasn't trying to go slow, just moderate. But then my brakes started making sounds, and I could feel heat coming off them. I managed to stop my bike, and yikes I couldn't even touch the rims! Smoking! I cried, I admired the beautiful hills, I listened to a chorus of birds, and I convinced myself I could do it. Somehow, I made it to where Jay was waiting, and after he reassured me that my caution was reasonable, we continued on. The last 2 miles were more gentle than the first 2, and we arrived at Wawawai Park without incident.
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| The oasis of Wawawai Park..... |
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| We stages a game of cribbage to send back to our cribbage group..... |
What a beautiful park! So green and lush. Little did we realize this was our last real shade, coolness, water, or rest for 25 miles, until we reached Clarkston. (cue ominous music....) After a quick break, snacks, drinking lots of water and downing some electrolyte pills, we filled up our bottles and shoved off.
As we rode through the parking area, I hear Jay from behind me: "Wait, Emily, stop. I think you have a flat tire." Huh, I was just thinking my bike felt kind of squishy... Sure enough it was a flat, on the rear tire. Take off panniers, take off wheel, replace tube. The culprit was a curved piece of wire which had stuck into the tread and worked its way through and to the tube. Back on the road. Later, I would wish we had taken another drink and filled up our bottles again.... (Are you getting tired of these foreshadowings yet?)
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| Another picture of Jay riding through the palouse hills. There will be lots of these...... |
Oh the beauty of the Snake River canyon. The river itself was wide, slow, and dirty. But the cliffs were these layers of different types of rock and soil. It reminded me of a cake. Bands of hard, rough rock, between layers of packed sediments that were softer textured. Traffic was light on this road, too. And amazingly polite. They would go all the way into the other lane to pass. Pretty awesome.
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| The Road to Hells Gate. seemed pretty sweet at first.... (stock photo) |
The wind was, of course, a head wind, but it was cool. For the first few miles. When we came around one bend in the road, suddenly the air was hot, the wind was hot, and the heat wafted up from the pavement under our wheels. We kept our eyes peeled for shade, and found it very hard to come by.
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| The yellow 2 marks our last water. The red square marks the RV store. Yes, that's 25 miles. |
There are three Army Corps rest areas. We stopped at the first one. They are dry rest areas, with no water. This was a surprise, only because neither one of us had registered this information in our research. The only thing that had stuck in my mind was the first 18 miles. We kept going.
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| Miles of this, only drier and hotter than this stock photo can ever convey. |
The next landing had shaded picnic tables. We stopped and ate, drank some of our water, and discussed our fate. The heat of the day was here, and we had no way to avoid it. We thought it was best to roll on and get it over with.
Now with 12 miles to go to Clarkston, and no let up of sun or headwind, and no promise of a shady rest stop, we channeled our inner Dory. "Just keep spinning, just keep spinning." Jay hunkered down and pedaled steady, and I could tell he was in "get through it" mode. The river had stopped being a source of beauty. Now it mocked us, a dirty river of water that we couldn't access. Looking back, I remember we had our super awesome water filter, and I think we could have gotten some water to drink if we had really really needed it.
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| Happier times, rolling through the hills. Before we entered Hells Canyon... Oh, if only we knew what lay ahead... |
We rounded another bend, and started to see evidence of civilization ahead. 5 miles to go. We can do this! Jay's now limited to monosyllabic, gutteral responses, and isn't even trying to draft any more. I felt so bad for him, just starting to recover from his cold, and I know he was struggling. I can't feel much of anything any more. We both are completely out of water. My lips were cracking, so dry. My frog tog cloth, which had been a lifesaver of coolness for the last few miles, was finally drying out and getting stiff, so I removed it.
At last, the bridge over the river into Clarkston. We see an RV park across the river. It's an oasis of greenness. I ask Jay if he wants to stop there to look for water or continue on in. He opts to continue in for a real place to stop. I'm in the lead, I go over the bridge, and pass the RV park. There's a sign, "Store!". I point to it, and pull over. I look back, but no Jay. I laugh, thinking he went to the store, and turn around. Still no Jay. I look back to the bridge, and THERE is Jay! He's off his bike, and I can't tell what's going on. Once I get back to him (which required hefting my bike over curbs, no fun), he had a flat on his front tire! He has his panniers off in his hands, and decided to half carry his bike off the bridge while I go to the store for cold liquid.
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| Our rest stop. I think we landed around spot 6. There was a shady grass area between each rv. |
Entering the tiny store was pure bliss when the AC hit me. I got us each sodas, ice cream bars, and filled all our water bottles up with ice water. Meanwhile, Jay found shade next to an RV. When I rolled up, he said, "You know that oasis of green? It's a golf course!" We hydrated, Jay fixed bike (culprit was a sharp something that deeply sliced the tire), I went back for more water. The Rv we were shading by had a long kite-like flag on it's antenna, and I enjoyed watching its shadow dance around. Once we finally started to feel more like ourselves again and could actually smile, we loaded up and traveled to the nearest coffee shop. We sat inside, patched tubes, and figured out our next steps.
Thankfully, the coffee shop was well located, next to a grocery store and a Walgreen. We shopped for dinner (chicken for Jay, salmon for Emily, pesto to go with the noodles we had, and fruit. I think I may have insisted on some ginger thin cookies, too. Walgreen for Kinesio tape for my thumbs (how could I forget that? Really?). Then we found the paved trail that led to our stop for the night: Hell's Canyon Park.
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| Trail along river to Hells Gate State Park. That isn't Jay. (stock photo) |
We enjoyed the 4 miles from Clarkston to the park. Once in the park, we went to the Lewis and Clark Museum and Office. In the museum, where we purchased our camping ticket, they had a large physical map, the size of two ping pong tables, that had the western states on them. You could push a button, and a trail or route would show up on the map in little colored lights the color of the button.
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| We stayed in C campground, near the river. |
At our camp site, we unpacked and I made dinner while Jay set up tent. After eating what seamed like the best meal I've ever eaten, we took showers, washed clothes, and crashed.
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| This was our oasis. (stock photo) |
Everything was tired. Every joint, muscle, and ligament. It was going to be a short sleep, because we wanted to get up early, get breakfast in Clarkston and hit the Old Spiral Highway before it got too hot. We knew there was no water for the first 20 miles, and ten of those miles were climbing climbing, climbing. While I was nervous as could be about that climbing, I felt good about this day's ride. By the end, it felt normal and natural to have my loaded bike, and I had even learned how to stand up in my seat a bit! I felt like Jay and I proved we could muscle through things and rely on each other when things got tough. After today, I felt like we could handle whatever came our way.
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