July 1, 2010
Well we started the day off with, as one of the park rangers put it, a 2.7 mile steep climb for “breakfast”. Once that was finished, we looked forward to getting to Lincoln City (35.5 miles away) for lunch. Now before we left the park, the ranger we were talking with told us to take the old Oregon bike route around the 2nd large climb of the day. We decided to take his advice and began the side route that was supposed to add a mile or two to our day. About 3 miles in we were still doing a gradual uphill and I came across a sign that showed us that the detour is 10 miles long (as opposed to 3 miles straight through the 101). At about the 5.5 mile mark (still going uphill), we ran into the cyclists that we’ve been camping around for the last two nights. We finally introduced ourselves, their names are Andrew and Naomi. They told us that they had notes about the route and that the elevation is actually the same no matter what route you take. The only difference is that the Oregon bike route has a long gradual uphill and the 101 route is a short steep uphill. We finally had a downhill descent after chatting with them for a while. That road (apparently it’s the old 101) is actually pretty nice, but also completely deserted aside from a few houses. We stood talking on the road for about 10-15 minutes without a single car going by.
So, now with our detour costing us an additional 8.5 miles (it dropped us off about a mile and half from the 101), we were back on the 101 heading South. I forgot to mention that it started raining on us right as we started the detour. As we got to Lincoln City (41 miles into the ride at this point), the rain just got stronger. We ate lunch slowly and went to the market afterwards to pickup food for dinner, unfortunately the rain never let up. We continued South in some heavy showers and got completely soaked from head to toe. Not only that, the shoulder kept coming and going for several miles. It was pretty hard to see the road with the rain hitting my glasses and the mist from the cars spraying at me, so me and Taka kicked it into another gear. I think that the adrenaline from the cold and dangerous conditions around us kept our legs moving at a quicker pace than we had done all day. I had several cars honk at me and I never dared to look back to see how close they were getting.
When we reached Depoe Bay (about 8 miles shy of our campground and over 56 miles into the day’s ride), we decided to stay at a motel so that we could try and dry out our things and sleep well. The place was fairly cheap and is right across from the beach here. Apparently they spot whales around here at other times of the year. We weren’t able to grab dinner because it’s a real small town and everything closes real early, so we’ll just have to wait for breakfast tomorrow. They don’t have laundry facilities here, but the receptionist was nice enough to dry my clothes for me in their industrial dryer.
The problem now is that we have to choose between doing two short rides over the next two days (effectively losing a day) or doing a 70 mile ride tomorrow. At this point we’re just going to play it by ear. It’s supposed to keep raining tomorrow, but I’m hoping that the rain will stop early and we’ll be able to ride comfortably.
Last note, I think the rain broke my phone (the one I’ve had for 6 years now!). People can hear me, but I can’t hear them. Hopefully it dries out and starts working again, otherwise I’ll be out of a phone until I can get to a Verizon store. On the flip side, I now feel a little more like a real cyclist with the combination of the distance we covered and the weather we went through.
-Chris