Pre-Tour
Our not-very comfortable flight from Dulles was delayed for about two hours so we missed our connection in Denver. Arriving at midnight their time, we were transported 30 minutes to a hotel, where we slept in beds (better than airport floor or seats) for about 3 hours. Then up at 4:30 AM to catch the shuttle back to the airport for our 7:AM flight which turned out to be much more comfortable and hospitable. We had fabulous views of the Cascades Mountains as we descended into Portland.
A friendly shuttle driver drove us the 45 minutes into the town of Vancouver, Washington, which was booked due to the price differential compared to Portland. It's a small town with a very comfortable, lived-in vibe. To try to deal with our jet-lag, we took a very hot walk through a town festival in the square in front of our hotel, and down through a pretty shabby industrial/retail area to the Columbia River. Other than the river, the main attraction was the oldest apple tree in the Northwest, so we hiked over a hot concrete path and took our picture. A really sweaty return walk put us right to bed for an afternoon rest, being sure not to sleep. Before dinner we took a ride around the block on our re-assembled bike to make sure everything was working properly. Then, a nice, easy dinner in a Hawaiian(!) themed restaurant and then back up to the room, buzzing from lack of sleep, to repack our bags minus biking gear for the start of the tour the next day.
Tour Day 1: Portland, Oregon
Today's ride took us through and out of Vancouver, over a long bridge with a narrow bike path (barriers on both sides) to the city of Portland proper. We rode through city streets to converge with other tandems at WestEndBikes, owned by a couple we had met on the Istanbul/Athens trip. Leaving our bikes on the street under their watchful eyes, we wandered downtown Portland, filled with all kinds of people in all kinds of attire as well as entire city blocks given over to food trucks. The ride back to Vancouver was full of thrills and chills, as we rode on an esplanade along the river on a Sunday afternoon with the rest of Portland on bikes, with strollers and walking. So crowded, we almost ran over a two-year old who acted like a squirrel in front of your car, frozen by the spectacle of many tandems and not knowing which way to go. Fortunately, Joe was able to anticipate which direction he would go and missed him by a hair. We then went back over not one but two bridges, again with the narrow lane, but this time with some walker coming toward us. The pedestrians had to duck between bridge girders to let us by. There was also a cyclist that had stopped and did the same thing for a tandem that was ahead of us, but she headed back out just as we were approaching. Fortunately, she kindly got back out of our way. After another tricky descent on a cloverleaf and across a street with a super tight up-hill turn onto a sidewalk, we tipped over. Joe hit the ground and I managed to stay upright over the bike. No idea how. The only damage was a little road rash for Joe and yet another lovely bruise on my right lower leg, my classic, I've- fallen-with-my-bike-badge-of-courage. It was a tiring, sort of hairy-in-places ride, but it is always so exciting to roll up to the boat for the first time and see our home for the week.
The American Empress is a lovely riverboat, smaller than the American Queen on the Mississippi last year; same wonderful red paddle in the rear and pristine white painted exterior. Each stateroom hallway is a gallery of paintings and artifacts with a different theme: natives of the Great Plains; natives of the Northwest; miners and pioneers. Ours has a Russian theme as this same boat toured Alaska before its present incarnation as the American Empress. There's more to that story that I have yet to discover.
After getting settled, we had a welcome reception on the top deck as the boat took us upriver through the city of Portland in the evening light, under 7 bridges with different mechanisms for raising and lowering. We had the good fortune to sit with a couple with our drinks. He was a former US Navy nuclear submarine captain who could tell us all we needed to know and more about the bridges and how they worked (he was movie star handsome in a strong/silent kind of way--unless talking about bridges); she was an artist in New Mexico and he lived in Massachusetts. They were separated but tandem travel partners--there are so many interesting people on these trips!. The boat turned around after the last bridge and back downriver we went. It's this kind of special arrangement with the cruise lines and negotiations with the boat captain that make traveling with Bill and Jan McCready special. Captain Andrea had never done that evening tour of Portland before. It was just lovely. Then we headed downriver overnight to the port at Longview, Washington, where we would begin our ride on Tuesday.
Day 2: Longview, Washington to Astoria, Oregon
Today begins the you-call-this-a vacation (???) schedule of the next 7 days: up with an alarm at 5:50; to breakfast in bike clothes with everybody else looking just like us; back to the room to brush teeth and grab our gear; off the boat and on a bus at 8. This tour was different from all our previous ones in that they bused us and trucked our bikes to remote starts on almost all the rides. The distances were just too long for people to make it back to the new port where the boat would be docked (except for those few teams who think nothing of riding upwards of 110 miles a day). Today the bus ride took 90 minutes to a random gas station inland, with a couple of port-a-potties and a drive-through coffee hut in the parking lot. Those cute little shacks are ubiquitous up here. Then comes the chaotic-looking scene of bikes being unloaded from the trucks, placed on the ground, and people wandering around looking for their bikes.
Our chosen ride of 31 miles took us along Highway 101 through forests and marshes west towards the Pacific. To get to see the actual ocean, we would have had to add 10 more miles and we didn't think it wise to do that. Sadly, that was the highlight of that ride. After a crazy ride through a busy beach town (which we were OK to miss) apparently there was a gorgeous stretch of bike trail along the ocean. It's always painful (at least for me) to hear other riders rave about the wonderful things we missed, but we are gradually learning to more-or-less pace ourselves for the next day's ride.
The ride into Astoria was the adventure portion of the day. There was plenty of traffic on the highway as we approached the long bridge across the Columbia from Washington to Astoria, Oregon. The first stretch of the bridge was pretty flat, but then the climb began with cars and trucks to our left and the bridge railing to our right, we huffed and puffed up to almost the top, where we were stopped (on the ascending grade) by a construction worker's sign. We squeezed up to be at the front of the traffic line, along with two or three other tandems. For what seemed like a long time, we hovered, holding onto the bridge railing in the ready-to-go position, which always kind of freaks me out, not to mention we had to start up on an incline. Fortunately, when they stopped oncoming traffic and turned the sign to "slow" the guy let the bikes go before the cars and trucks. What a relief! Very soon we were on a steep cloverleaf descent into the town where we picked up a sort of Boardwalk along the river which was also the trolley route; meaning that the trolley rails had the perfect size gap to catch a bike tire. Which is exactly what it did to us. Not the best way to come to a sudden halt. Fortunately, we didn't go over, and the tire seemed undamaged except for tiny threads shaved off. Close one. So dodging pedestrians and avoiding any more trolley tracks, we had an exciting approach to our lovely boat.
After dinner we went to the top deck to see the sunset and discovered a Coast Guard Cutter docked right behind us with Coast Guard Guys (I don't know what they're called) were standing at attention, getting ready to lower the flag at sunset. It was such a small boat, and they were only three, but they were as disciplined as if the Admiral (?) had been there. It was a privilege to witness such solemnity and reverent care taken with our country's flag when nobody important was watching. We stayed until the flag was folded and stowed.
Day 3: Mount St. Helens
Overnight the boat chugged back upriver to where we had started our day yesterday, Longview, WA. We were bused for 90 minutes up to the Mount St. Helens Visitor Center. Just WOW. We had a really informative Ranger talk about how the volcano behaved the weeks prior to and the day of the massive, explosive, incredibly powerful eruption that was over in minutes, leaving devastation for miles in all direction. We didn't know much about it except that it had happened 30 years ago. So interesting. And the close up view of the crater was just so impressive!
Back on the bus for a short shuttle to our starting point for the day, a scenic overlook parking area, where the trucks were waiting. Joe helped unload the bikes, as he often does on these trips, so we were among the last to take off. We figured with the long descent from that elevation, it would be a good time to go for a distance record: 52 miles.
Down we went! 35-43 mph for almost 20 miles. Joe is such a good descender that we passed most, if not all, of those who started ahead of us. One couple, whom we are very friendly with, did not go over 20 mph because the stoker forbade it. I totally understand, as I was scared to death of those speeds in the early days of our riding. Now I just let go, trust Joe's skill and white-knuckle just a little bit. Besides, the mountain scenery was gorgeous, and unlike Joe, I can look around some and enjoy it. The rest of the ride was on state roads and the final 7 was along a stream on "Pleasant Hill Road." I got really excited as we racked up the miles past our previous distance record. The approach to the ship was through a nasty industrial region, but I didn't care. It just felt so good to have ridden that far.
That evening, we sailed upriver back through Portland and Vancouver. It was fun to go under all those bridges again in the evening light.
Day 4: Rest Day on the Empress
After 3 straight days of riding, we decided that the better part of valor was to take a rest day on the boat. Excellent choice. Because of the special biking routes and planning of the McCreadys, we again zig-zagged back DOWN the river from our overnight destination, The Dalles, Oregon, which was the official end of the Oregon Trail, back in pioneer days. The riders got off and we headed back toward Stevenson, Washington. We spent the morning starting the blog in the Paddlewheel Lounge, watching the huge red paddlewheel do it's amazing thing. We took our "box lunch" to the fore deck and talked with the full-time riverlorian, who pointed out waterfalls on the banks, eagles nests, and talked about the geology and history of the river and settlements on its banks. (She also held nightly talks before or after dinner, mostly about aspects of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.). The scenery really was breathtaking. Absolutely pristine: no sign of human presence on the banks; just hills and trees and wildlife. So, so peaceful and renewing!
After a stop in Stevenson to pick up riders, the evening was a "deck party" so we could all be up top to watch the boat go through the lock at the Bonneville Dam. What a fascinating experience. Locks are really very simple: the boat comes up to a closed gate in the front, another gate closes in the back, and (in this case, going downriver) the boat slowly lowers straight down so that it feels like you are in a very dark, dank cave; then the front gate opens, the light returns and you chug forward out into the river. What a great first experience.
Day 5: Waterfalls and the Bonneville Dam
From Troutdale, buses took us up from the ship to an overlook called "The Women's Forum," named for an old women's conservation organization. The view was spectacular, but as usual, the practicalities are always interesting. Not knowing when I would see another bathroom on our 28-mile ride, I quickly hopped back on the bus to go and in the struggle to wiggle out of my bib shorts (never again!), the magnet on the back of my name tag (we wear them 100% of the time when we are not in our staterooms) clinked away somewhere never to be seen again and the name tag itself landed in the you-know-where. I quick grabbed it out (3 second rule?), cleaned it off with the hand sanitizer and stashed it in my bag. When we got back to the ship, I washed it again five times and put it in such a safe place while I waited for another magnet, that it, too, was never seen again. Amazingly, I didn't even get scolded for not having my name on for the rest of the trip.
Annyyywwwaaayyyy...off we went up the scenic Old Columbia Gorge Highway. We stopped at two of probably five waterfalls we passed, dodging tourist pedestrians and cars to stop and gaze. Our scheduled "attraction" for the day was a fish hatchery, fish counting station, fish ladders, and a tour of the Bonneville Dam itself. It was very interesting to see all kinds of salmon and sturgeon swimming upstream and jumping over or going under each step in the ladders. We had an underwater view of them as well and could watch the fish counters in action. We skipped the longer tour of the dam, took a peek at the massively famous "Herman the Sturgeon" and hopped back on the bike.
Meanwhile, the boat was going back UP river and proceeding through the lock while we were touring the dam. We caught a glimpse of it entering the lock at one point along the ride.
After a couple of really challenging hills, we came to bike path with a set of stairs down which we carried our bike and then rode to and over the "Bridge of the Gods." Ohmygoodness, the view on either side was just indescribably spectacular. Too bad Joe had to focus on the grill surface of the bridge and miss the views (I did NOT look down through the grill); another instance of "stoker's advantage," which is really "stoker's consolation" for having close to zero control over where, when, and how fast we ride.
The meal pattern for every day was a big breakfast at 6:AM, then energy bars on the road, snacks in the lounge when we got back on the ship usually around 2 or 3 PM, then dinner at 5:30. On other trips Santana has catered lunches at a spot mid-way through the rides, but because they were trying to make rides reasonable, given the difficult climbs up from the ship every day, they traded the hassle of trucking bikes and busing people for lunch on the road. It worked fine for us, as we would rather not stop for any length of time during a ride. The waterfall stops and the long stop at the dam today reaffirmed that we would rather just ride on through. The legs get stiff and fatigue starts to set in otherwise and it's hard to get going again. There's always a tension between wanting to see the sights and not wanting to stop. Always some kind of trade-off.
After dinner later in our room, we realized that we were going through another lock and went out on our veranda to see. We were halfway up a super deep lock; couldn't see the top or bottom and it was dark and damp. I could reach out and touch the clammy concrete blocks of the lock. So weird. It was a relief sometime later to rise to the top and see land again!
Day 6: Pendleton
Today, we bused inland up to a Native American museum in Umatilla, Oregon. Overnight we had gone from mountainous and green to brown, dry ravines and hills. The change on scenery was really quite dramatic. The museum was interesting with artifacts from the Umatilla people whose reservation is nearby, but we had maybe a half-hour to get on the road to make our tours in the town of Pendleton. The ride into town was an easy mostly downhill 8 miles. The first stop was the Pendleton Woolen Mills, established in the 19th Century and still producing woolen clothes and blankets today. In a planning glitch, they weren't expecting tons of cyclists descending on their small outlet shop and factory. Two groups got into the tour and then the rest of us were told there were no more tours. Our fearless leaders leaped into action and before we knew it, we were touring the clattering floor full of carding and spinning machines and all kinds of looms making intricately patterned fabric. I loved it. There was surprisingly no trouble getting right up close to the machines and taking pictures. Looms always make me think of my Grandma Boles, the weaver, and now of Emilia, the expert knitter in our family.
From the mill, we rode another mile through an old "Wild West" town to a confusing couple of hours. First order of business: load the bike on the truck for another transit to our afternoon ride after activities in town. This was the only place lunch would be provided (in an old club house looking saloon with a huge relocated mahogany bar with etchings and blood stains, or so we were told). Before lunch they started us out at a storefront from which we were to take an Underground tour. They were not prepared for us, either. A couple of groups started the tour, then Jan told us to walk two blocks to lunch because otherwise we would miss it, and then come back for the tour. So we did, in the blazing heat. It's hilarious to take a step back and see a small town overrun with crazy-looking people in wildly colored biking clothes and clunking around in shoes with cleats. After lunch in the saloon, we were told to rush back to the "museum" for the last tour. Joe chose to stay while I did the rushing. The tour was interesting, but not a must-see. There were 6 or 7 rooms underground portraying ways of life over time in Pendleton. There was a saloon of course, a bunk house for Chinese railroad workers, a butcher's work and storage space, a Speakeasy, etc., etc.
After racing back to catch the bus (Joe standing outside hollering), we rode maybe a half-hour to a gravel road between wheat fields in the middle of NOWHERE. The trucks were waiting. So I realized there, once again, would be no bathrooms for the rest of the day, I ducked back on the bus to the bathroom. Fortunately I didn't have a name tag to drop in the toilet, so no problem.
We took off on the nearest asphalt road and had a great 20 mile ride up and down rolling terrain that felt like dessert but was really already-cut wheat fields. It was hot, but dry and our riding really felt in sync. We thought we were going 23 or 27 miles to some stop where they would pick us up. Had no idea. As we soared down a hill and around a corner, there they were, at only 20 miles. Were given the option to ride 10 more miles on the side of a busier road and THEN get picked up. We got on the bus. A couple of captains chose to ride their tandems further without their stokers. Some people just want to RIDE.
Our boat was at another spot that they had never come into before: Sacajawea State Park. A really lovely park, with the gangway plunked down right in the middle. I love riding up to the boat in a new location just to see it nestled among the trees, or beside the mansion or wherever Bill McCready wants and can convince the boat captain to stop. As the bus approached the boat, one of the crew members was walking along barefoot, looking quite distressed. The bus stopped for him and he was hot, probably dehydrated and disoriented. He said he had been walking near? In? The marsh and came very close to a couple of Copperheads and lost his shoes. He was one of our servers at dinner and said he had (mostly) recovered. After dinner we sat on the deck to turn up the Snake River and gaze at the beautiful brown hills dotted with Washington State vineyards.
Day 7: Lewiston/Clarkston and Post-tour
As we woke up, the boat, having passed through the last of 8 locks at the Lower Granite Dam, was just putting into a small boat ramp on the Washington side of the Snake River called Nasqually John Landing. A couple of people stood in front of their camper on the side of the road to watch. No buses today. We took off onto the road right beside the Snake River into Idaho. Up and over a bridge into Lewiston, Idaho (people count how many states they’ve ridden in; I guess we should start; even a couple of miles count), named for, whom else, Merriweather Lewis. Then another bridge into Clarkston, Washington, named for…..William Clark. The two had passed right through on the Idaho side of the Snake on their famous expedition and it was here that they finally received assistance from the Nez Perce (should we kill them or help them? A female elder, Wetxuuwiis, convinced her people to “do them no harm”).
This was a mostly flat ride, but when I got up, I knew I was already really, really tired, but didn’t want to miss the last ride of the tour. When we got back after a fairly easy 20 miles, I just collapsed. Went to our stateroom and fell into bed (this is 10:30 in the morning). Slept for maybe 45 minutes and got up for lunch, still exhausted. The afternoon was spent packing as our luggage had to be outside our room by 11:PM. We kept toothbrushes and tomorrow’s clothes, but that was it.
Sunday morning they kicked us off the boat before 8:AM. We took a lovely 2 hour + (the driver took a wrong turn at Coeur d’Alene, Idaho) and were deposited at our hotel in Spokane. What an interesting city. A river with little falls runs through, with a park on one side near our hotel. We had a couple of good meals sitting outside watching the white water. In the park that day was some kind of Native American festival, which was very cool. Native dancing contests for kids (great drumming with that) and lots of vendors selling all sorts of Indian related art and clothing.
After an uneventful flight back to Denver (thank heaven), on Monday, we settled in there and then spent a beautiful day Tuesday in Boulder with our nephew David, his wife, Jessica and their 2-year old, Diego. Boulder is just lovely; they can see the Rockies from their bedroom window. They took us scrambling up a rocky, craggy trail to a high point overlooking all of Boulder. The weather was gorgeous. It was a special time with them.
The ride back to Denver was a different story. We hit a heavy hailstorm that piled hail up on the highway between lanes and looked exactly like snow. Then we drove out of it into nothing. Crazy.
We had a long but again uneventful day on Wednesday from Denver, transferring at O’Hare, back to Dulles. Home at 12:30 AM. Joe headed back to work at Spokes (bike shop) the very next day. Another wonderful trip with Santana and we are forward to trip to Italy with Santana in October.
Our not-very comfortable flight from Dulles was delayed for about two hours so we missed our connection in Denver. Arriving at midnight their time, we were transported 30 minutes to a hotel, where we slept in beds (better than airport floor or seats) for about 3 hours. Then up at 4:30 AM to catch the shuttle back to the airport for our 7:AM flight which turned out to be much more comfortable and hospitable. We had fabulous views of the Cascades Mountains as we descended into Portland.
A friendly shuttle driver drove us the 45 minutes into the town of Vancouver, Washington, which was booked due to the price differential compared to Portland. It's a small town with a very comfortable, lived-in vibe. To try to deal with our jet-lag, we took a very hot walk through a town festival in the square in front of our hotel, and down through a pretty shabby industrial/retail area to the Columbia River. Other than the river, the main attraction was the oldest apple tree in the Northwest, so we hiked over a hot concrete path and took our picture. A really sweaty return walk put us right to bed for an afternoon rest, being sure not to sleep. Before dinner we took a ride around the block on our re-assembled bike to make sure everything was working properly. Then, a nice, easy dinner in a Hawaiian(!) themed restaurant and then back up to the room, buzzing from lack of sleep, to repack our bags minus biking gear for the start of the tour the next day.
Tour Day 1: Portland, Oregon
Today's ride took us through and out of Vancouver, over a long bridge with a narrow bike path (barriers on both sides) to the city of Portland proper. We rode through city streets to converge with other tandems at WestEndBikes, owned by a couple we had met on the Istanbul/Athens trip. Leaving our bikes on the street under their watchful eyes, we wandered downtown Portland, filled with all kinds of people in all kinds of attire as well as entire city blocks given over to food trucks. The ride back to Vancouver was full of thrills and chills, as we rode on an esplanade along the river on a Sunday afternoon with the rest of Portland on bikes, with strollers and walking. So crowded, we almost ran over a two-year old who acted like a squirrel in front of your car, frozen by the spectacle of many tandems and not knowing which way to go. Fortunately, Joe was able to anticipate which direction he would go and missed him by a hair. We then went back over not one but two bridges, again with the narrow lane, but this time with some walker coming toward us. The pedestrians had to duck between bridge girders to let us by. There was also a cyclist that had stopped and did the same thing for a tandem that was ahead of us, but she headed back out just as we were approaching. Fortunately, she kindly got back out of our way. After another tricky descent on a cloverleaf and across a street with a super tight up-hill turn onto a sidewalk, we tipped over. Joe hit the ground and I managed to stay upright over the bike. No idea how. The only damage was a little road rash for Joe and yet another lovely bruise on my right lower leg, my classic, I've- fallen-with-my-bike-badge-of-courage. It was a tiring, sort of hairy-in-places ride, but it is always so exciting to roll up to the boat for the first time and see our home for the week.
The American Empress is a lovely riverboat, smaller than the American Queen on the Mississippi last year; same wonderful red paddle in the rear and pristine white painted exterior. Each stateroom hallway is a gallery of paintings and artifacts with a different theme: natives of the Great Plains; natives of the Northwest; miners and pioneers. Ours has a Russian theme as this same boat toured Alaska before its present incarnation as the American Empress. There's more to that story that I have yet to discover.
After getting settled, we had a welcome reception on the top deck as the boat took us upriver through the city of Portland in the evening light, under 7 bridges with different mechanisms for raising and lowering. We had the good fortune to sit with a couple with our drinks. He was a former US Navy nuclear submarine captain who could tell us all we needed to know and more about the bridges and how they worked (he was movie star handsome in a strong/silent kind of way--unless talking about bridges); she was an artist in New Mexico and he lived in Massachusetts. They were separated but tandem travel partners--there are so many interesting people on these trips!. The boat turned around after the last bridge and back downriver we went. It's this kind of special arrangement with the cruise lines and negotiations with the boat captain that make traveling with Bill and Jan McCready special. Captain Andrea had never done that evening tour of Portland before. It was just lovely. Then we headed downriver overnight to the port at Longview, Washington, where we would begin our ride on Tuesday.
Day 2: Longview, Washington to Astoria, Oregon
Today begins the you-call-this-a vacation (???) schedule of the next 7 days: up with an alarm at 5:50; to breakfast in bike clothes with everybody else looking just like us; back to the room to brush teeth and grab our gear; off the boat and on a bus at 8. This tour was different from all our previous ones in that they bused us and trucked our bikes to remote starts on almost all the rides. The distances were just too long for people to make it back to the new port where the boat would be docked (except for those few teams who think nothing of riding upwards of 110 miles a day). Today the bus ride took 90 minutes to a random gas station inland, with a couple of port-a-potties and a drive-through coffee hut in the parking lot. Those cute little shacks are ubiquitous up here. Then comes the chaotic-looking scene of bikes being unloaded from the trucks, placed on the ground, and people wandering around looking for their bikes.
Our chosen ride of 31 miles took us along Highway 101 through forests and marshes west towards the Pacific. To get to see the actual ocean, we would have had to add 10 more miles and we didn't think it wise to do that. Sadly, that was the highlight of that ride. After a crazy ride through a busy beach town (which we were OK to miss) apparently there was a gorgeous stretch of bike trail along the ocean. It's always painful (at least for me) to hear other riders rave about the wonderful things we missed, but we are gradually learning to more-or-less pace ourselves for the next day's ride.
The ride into Astoria was the adventure portion of the day. There was plenty of traffic on the highway as we approached the long bridge across the Columbia from Washington to Astoria, Oregon. The first stretch of the bridge was pretty flat, but then the climb began with cars and trucks to our left and the bridge railing to our right, we huffed and puffed up to almost the top, where we were stopped (on the ascending grade) by a construction worker's sign. We squeezed up to be at the front of the traffic line, along with two or three other tandems. For what seemed like a long time, we hovered, holding onto the bridge railing in the ready-to-go position, which always kind of freaks me out, not to mention we had to start up on an incline. Fortunately, when they stopped oncoming traffic and turned the sign to "slow" the guy let the bikes go before the cars and trucks. What a relief! Very soon we were on a steep cloverleaf descent into the town where we picked up a sort of Boardwalk along the river which was also the trolley route; meaning that the trolley rails had the perfect size gap to catch a bike tire. Which is exactly what it did to us. Not the best way to come to a sudden halt. Fortunately, we didn't go over, and the tire seemed undamaged except for tiny threads shaved off. Close one. So dodging pedestrians and avoiding any more trolley tracks, we had an exciting approach to our lovely boat.
After dinner we went to the top deck to see the sunset and discovered a Coast Guard Cutter docked right behind us with Coast Guard Guys (I don't know what they're called) were standing at attention, getting ready to lower the flag at sunset. It was such a small boat, and they were only three, but they were as disciplined as if the Admiral (?) had been there. It was a privilege to witness such solemnity and reverent care taken with our country's flag when nobody important was watching. We stayed until the flag was folded and stowed.
Day 3: Mount St. Helens
Overnight the boat chugged back upriver to where we had started our day yesterday, Longview, WA. We were bused for 90 minutes up to the Mount St. Helens Visitor Center. Just WOW. We had a really informative Ranger talk about how the volcano behaved the weeks prior to and the day of the massive, explosive, incredibly powerful eruption that was over in minutes, leaving devastation for miles in all direction. We didn't know much about it except that it had happened 30 years ago. So interesting. And the close up view of the crater was just so impressive!
Back on the bus for a short shuttle to our starting point for the day, a scenic overlook parking area, where the trucks were waiting. Joe helped unload the bikes, as he often does on these trips, so we were among the last to take off. We figured with the long descent from that elevation, it would be a good time to go for a distance record: 52 miles.
Down we went! 35-43 mph for almost 20 miles. Joe is such a good descender that we passed most, if not all, of those who started ahead of us. One couple, whom we are very friendly with, did not go over 20 mph because the stoker forbade it. I totally understand, as I was scared to death of those speeds in the early days of our riding. Now I just let go, trust Joe's skill and white-knuckle just a little bit. Besides, the mountain scenery was gorgeous, and unlike Joe, I can look around some and enjoy it. The rest of the ride was on state roads and the final 7 was along a stream on "Pleasant Hill Road." I got really excited as we racked up the miles past our previous distance record. The approach to the ship was through a nasty industrial region, but I didn't care. It just felt so good to have ridden that far.
That evening, we sailed upriver back through Portland and Vancouver. It was fun to go under all those bridges again in the evening light.
Day 4: Rest Day on the Empress
After 3 straight days of riding, we decided that the better part of valor was to take a rest day on the boat. Excellent choice. Because of the special biking routes and planning of the McCreadys, we again zig-zagged back DOWN the river from our overnight destination, The Dalles, Oregon, which was the official end of the Oregon Trail, back in pioneer days. The riders got off and we headed back toward Stevenson, Washington. We spent the morning starting the blog in the Paddlewheel Lounge, watching the huge red paddlewheel do it's amazing thing. We took our "box lunch" to the fore deck and talked with the full-time riverlorian, who pointed out waterfalls on the banks, eagles nests, and talked about the geology and history of the river and settlements on its banks. (She also held nightly talks before or after dinner, mostly about aspects of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.). The scenery really was breathtaking. Absolutely pristine: no sign of human presence on the banks; just hills and trees and wildlife. So, so peaceful and renewing!
After a stop in Stevenson to pick up riders, the evening was a "deck party" so we could all be up top to watch the boat go through the lock at the Bonneville Dam. What a fascinating experience. Locks are really very simple: the boat comes up to a closed gate in the front, another gate closes in the back, and (in this case, going downriver) the boat slowly lowers straight down so that it feels like you are in a very dark, dank cave; then the front gate opens, the light returns and you chug forward out into the river. What a great first experience.
Day 5: Waterfalls and the Bonneville Dam
From Troutdale, buses took us up from the ship to an overlook called "The Women's Forum," named for an old women's conservation organization. The view was spectacular, but as usual, the practicalities are always interesting. Not knowing when I would see another bathroom on our 28-mile ride, I quickly hopped back on the bus to go and in the struggle to wiggle out of my bib shorts (never again!), the magnet on the back of my name tag (we wear them 100% of the time when we are not in our staterooms) clinked away somewhere never to be seen again and the name tag itself landed in the you-know-where. I quick grabbed it out (3 second rule?), cleaned it off with the hand sanitizer and stashed it in my bag. When we got back to the ship, I washed it again five times and put it in such a safe place while I waited for another magnet, that it, too, was never seen again. Amazingly, I didn't even get scolded for not having my name on for the rest of the trip.
Annyyywwwaaayyyy...off we went up the scenic Old Columbia Gorge Highway. We stopped at two of probably five waterfalls we passed, dodging tourist pedestrians and cars to stop and gaze. Our scheduled "attraction" for the day was a fish hatchery, fish counting station, fish ladders, and a tour of the Bonneville Dam itself. It was very interesting to see all kinds of salmon and sturgeon swimming upstream and jumping over or going under each step in the ladders. We had an underwater view of them as well and could watch the fish counters in action. We skipped the longer tour of the dam, took a peek at the massively famous "Herman the Sturgeon" and hopped back on the bike.
Meanwhile, the boat was going back UP river and proceeding through the lock while we were touring the dam. We caught a glimpse of it entering the lock at one point along the ride.
After a couple of really challenging hills, we came to bike path with a set of stairs down which we carried our bike and then rode to and over the "Bridge of the Gods." Ohmygoodness, the view on either side was just indescribably spectacular. Too bad Joe had to focus on the grill surface of the bridge and miss the views (I did NOT look down through the grill); another instance of "stoker's advantage," which is really "stoker's consolation" for having close to zero control over where, when, and how fast we ride.
The meal pattern for every day was a big breakfast at 6:AM, then energy bars on the road, snacks in the lounge when we got back on the ship usually around 2 or 3 PM, then dinner at 5:30. On other trips Santana has catered lunches at a spot mid-way through the rides, but because they were trying to make rides reasonable, given the difficult climbs up from the ship every day, they traded the hassle of trucking bikes and busing people for lunch on the road. It worked fine for us, as we would rather not stop for any length of time during a ride. The waterfall stops and the long stop at the dam today reaffirmed that we would rather just ride on through. The legs get stiff and fatigue starts to set in otherwise and it's hard to get going again. There's always a tension between wanting to see the sights and not wanting to stop. Always some kind of trade-off.
After dinner later in our room, we realized that we were going through another lock and went out on our veranda to see. We were halfway up a super deep lock; couldn't see the top or bottom and it was dark and damp. I could reach out and touch the clammy concrete blocks of the lock. So weird. It was a relief sometime later to rise to the top and see land again!
Day 6: Pendleton
Today, we bused inland up to a Native American museum in Umatilla, Oregon. Overnight we had gone from mountainous and green to brown, dry ravines and hills. The change on scenery was really quite dramatic. The museum was interesting with artifacts from the Umatilla people whose reservation is nearby, but we had maybe a half-hour to get on the road to make our tours in the town of Pendleton. The ride into town was an easy mostly downhill 8 miles. The first stop was the Pendleton Woolen Mills, established in the 19th Century and still producing woolen clothes and blankets today. In a planning glitch, they weren't expecting tons of cyclists descending on their small outlet shop and factory. Two groups got into the tour and then the rest of us were told there were no more tours. Our fearless leaders leaped into action and before we knew it, we were touring the clattering floor full of carding and spinning machines and all kinds of looms making intricately patterned fabric. I loved it. There was surprisingly no trouble getting right up close to the machines and taking pictures. Looms always make me think of my Grandma Boles, the weaver, and now of Emilia, the expert knitter in our family.
From the mill, we rode another mile through an old "Wild West" town to a confusing couple of hours. First order of business: load the bike on the truck for another transit to our afternoon ride after activities in town. This was the only place lunch would be provided (in an old club house looking saloon with a huge relocated mahogany bar with etchings and blood stains, or so we were told). Before lunch they started us out at a storefront from which we were to take an Underground tour. They were not prepared for us, either. A couple of groups started the tour, then Jan told us to walk two blocks to lunch because otherwise we would miss it, and then come back for the tour. So we did, in the blazing heat. It's hilarious to take a step back and see a small town overrun with crazy-looking people in wildly colored biking clothes and clunking around in shoes with cleats. After lunch in the saloon, we were told to rush back to the "museum" for the last tour. Joe chose to stay while I did the rushing. The tour was interesting, but not a must-see. There were 6 or 7 rooms underground portraying ways of life over time in Pendleton. There was a saloon of course, a bunk house for Chinese railroad workers, a butcher's work and storage space, a Speakeasy, etc., etc.
After racing back to catch the bus (Joe standing outside hollering), we rode maybe a half-hour to a gravel road between wheat fields in the middle of NOWHERE. The trucks were waiting. So I realized there, once again, would be no bathrooms for the rest of the day, I ducked back on the bus to the bathroom. Fortunately I didn't have a name tag to drop in the toilet, so no problem.
We took off on the nearest asphalt road and had a great 20 mile ride up and down rolling terrain that felt like dessert but was really already-cut wheat fields. It was hot, but dry and our riding really felt in sync. We thought we were going 23 or 27 miles to some stop where they would pick us up. Had no idea. As we soared down a hill and around a corner, there they were, at only 20 miles. Were given the option to ride 10 more miles on the side of a busier road and THEN get picked up. We got on the bus. A couple of captains chose to ride their tandems further without their stokers. Some people just want to RIDE.
Our boat was at another spot that they had never come into before: Sacajawea State Park. A really lovely park, with the gangway plunked down right in the middle. I love riding up to the boat in a new location just to see it nestled among the trees, or beside the mansion or wherever Bill McCready wants and can convince the boat captain to stop. As the bus approached the boat, one of the crew members was walking along barefoot, looking quite distressed. The bus stopped for him and he was hot, probably dehydrated and disoriented. He said he had been walking near? In? The marsh and came very close to a couple of Copperheads and lost his shoes. He was one of our servers at dinner and said he had (mostly) recovered. After dinner we sat on the deck to turn up the Snake River and gaze at the beautiful brown hills dotted with Washington State vineyards.
Day 7: Lewiston/Clarkston and Post-tour
As we woke up, the boat, having passed through the last of 8 locks at the Lower Granite Dam, was just putting into a small boat ramp on the Washington side of the Snake River called Nasqually John Landing. A couple of people stood in front of their camper on the side of the road to watch. No buses today. We took off onto the road right beside the Snake River into Idaho. Up and over a bridge into Lewiston, Idaho (people count how many states they’ve ridden in; I guess we should start; even a couple of miles count), named for, whom else, Merriweather Lewis. Then another bridge into Clarkston, Washington, named for…..William Clark. The two had passed right through on the Idaho side of the Snake on their famous expedition and it was here that they finally received assistance from the Nez Perce (should we kill them or help them? A female elder, Wetxuuwiis, convinced her people to “do them no harm”).
This was a mostly flat ride, but when I got up, I knew I was already really, really tired, but didn’t want to miss the last ride of the tour. When we got back after a fairly easy 20 miles, I just collapsed. Went to our stateroom and fell into bed (this is 10:30 in the morning). Slept for maybe 45 minutes and got up for lunch, still exhausted. The afternoon was spent packing as our luggage had to be outside our room by 11:PM. We kept toothbrushes and tomorrow’s clothes, but that was it.
Sunday morning they kicked us off the boat before 8:AM. We took a lovely 2 hour + (the driver took a wrong turn at Coeur d’Alene, Idaho) and were deposited at our hotel in Spokane. What an interesting city. A river with little falls runs through, with a park on one side near our hotel. We had a couple of good meals sitting outside watching the white water. In the park that day was some kind of Native American festival, which was very cool. Native dancing contests for kids (great drumming with that) and lots of vendors selling all sorts of Indian related art and clothing.
After an uneventful flight back to Denver (thank heaven), on Monday, we settled in there and then spent a beautiful day Tuesday in Boulder with our nephew David, his wife, Jessica and their 2-year old, Diego. Boulder is just lovely; they can see the Rockies from their bedroom window. They took us scrambling up a rocky, craggy trail to a high point overlooking all of Boulder. The weather was gorgeous. It was a special time with them.
The ride back to Denver was a different story. We hit a heavy hailstorm that piled hail up on the highway between lanes and looked exactly like snow. Then we drove out of it into nothing. Crazy.
We had a long but again uneventful day on Wednesday from Denver, transferring at O’Hare, back to Dulles. Home at 12:30 AM. Joe headed back to work at Spokes (bike shop) the very next day. Another wonderful trip with Santana and we are forward to trip to Italy with Santana in October.
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