Written by Dave

Day 4 – June 1 – 61 Miles, 1,919 feet climbing (Coburg to Belknap Hot Springs)

Team 3 – with the addition of Pete – enjoyed a lovely tailwind back ride up the McKenzie River today. Pete slotted right in speed wise and more importantly, I don’t think we killed the rest of the team with too many “Pete and Dave” stories. There are lots of them – we’ve been friends since 4^th grade.

We targeted leaving camp at 7AM and most of the team was ready, minus Chris and Pete. I’m giving Chris a pass as he’s still working out how to get everything in his bags. And Pete gets a pass for this being his first day. I’m sure that their performance will improve (and I know they read this). Curtis is the team’s early riser and was first ready, even after eating his first brekkie, which none of us did. The reason we didn’t eat in camp was because there was an iHop (International House of Pancakes) almost directly on route. Everyone had pancakes today, not just Nancy.

We had one more stop to make – Fred Meyer – for groceries. Shopping for food is rarely talked about in touring blogs as it’s not overly glamorous. But it has to be done every day and it needs to be thought up in advance. There is rarely a grocery store right next to camp. Cooking for 5 will be harder but we managed respectable, healthy dinners the last couple nights.

We had about 25 miles to ride to reach our lunch stop but stopped for coffee at 20 miles. This may not have made sense except that we are working hard to get into “trip mode” and Nancy spotted a good looking coffee stand. Stopping had to be done, the coffees were great and everyone got a little more chilled. We stopped 5 miles later for lunch in Vida, at the Vida Café. There will be days on this trip when we are sitting on the side of the road in dirt eating peanut butter and jelly. But today we had a proper lunch. They put on a nice spread.

After lunch the tailwind increased, the traffic died down and the shoulder got wider. It really was a lovely ride up the McKenzie River. We stopped at a famous covered bridge for photos. I took a picture there in 1993 of Pete and Inge – Pete recreated it today with Nancy and I. We later stopped for photos in the town of Nimrod to recreate another photo of Pete and I from 1993. “Still in 4^th grade”, or something to that affect was all Nancy offered.

We carried on to the McKenzie Bridge store for supplies, a cold drink and one more photo recreation. Nancy and I took a snap at the mailbox at the store. We have the same photo from 1992. The guy running the store told me a tale of how the mail box was almost removed during a Trump era push to streamline the USPS. The locals were outraged, the mailbox saved and we got our photo.  The old grocery store is now a rather fancy café with a few higher-priced fancier items, so times have really changed since we last passed through.  They did have some nice beers though, so we got one to have later in camp.

It was 5 miles from there to camp. In route we spotted a couple in a van with bikes at the turn off to McKenzie Pass. They were loading the van having just come over the pass. This is great news because we now know the pass is open for bikes. It is closed for cars and the paving project on the other side of the pass has not started – woohoo – we are excited about the climb.

But the pass is for Monday – tomorrow we are taking a rest day. We can use the rest for sure, but more important, there is a front coming through. They are calling for 1 to 1.5 inches of rain tomorrow. We took advantage of the weather to book two nights in at a dry cabin at Belknap Hotsprings. Our cabin isn’t fancy but it’s got everything we need. Four bunk bed platforms and a nice-sized room to spread out, which is more than we were expecting.  Nancy proved again that I won the wife lottery by declaring “this is great!” when we arrived. Considering that it is only one room and she is sleeping with 4 grumpy old men, well, how lucky am I!

I’ll get some sort of post out tomorrow – maybe one of my travelling companions will be keen, perhaps Chris or Pete, so that they can defend their packing reputations. We also have long soaks in the hot spring planned. Not a bad way to spend a raining day in the Cascade foothills….