Saturday, July 26, 2008

Through the Gorge and to the Pacific

It seems every time I near a major destination, the headwinds just go crazy, trying to get me to give up. Just before slipping into Glacier National Park, there were some horrific winds swooping off the mountains and hitting me unabated across the prairie. Then just this past week for 3 straight days, I was dealing with constant headwinds of 30mph with gusts into the 40s and I wouldn't be surprised if several hit 50mph! There weren't just white caps on the Columbia River, there were 6-8ft seas... and that was going against the current too! It was unbelievable... even the folks who live there were telling me, "Usually it's windy, but not this windy." I am positive that I was defying all known laws of physics as I was putting plenty of work into a system yet at times none was transferred to energy... I would pedal pedal pedal and go no where. All my effort was literally thrown to the wind.

The Columbia River Gorge is a quite fascinating place. I hit the river in SE Washington, near Walla Walla, and found the landscape to be a desert. I didn't know there was a desert in Oregon and Washington, but later I found out that the Cascade Mountains stop all the moisture from crossing them, giving a swath of land just east of the peaks a very arid climate. I counted 3 bundles of tumbleweed blow by me during my windy desert day. As you proceed west, the annual rainfall increases and vegetation increases as well until you reach the Cascades themselves which are home to vast forests. You can hopefully see that progression in the next 3 pictures which are each a day's ride apart.

Desert-like setting...


Smaller vegetation begins, with a volcanic snow-capped peak of the Cascades on the horizon...

A view back up the gorge through the Cascades...

After surviving the gorge, I was rewarded with Portland, Oregon! What a great city! I knew it was one of the most bicycle-friendly cities in America, but it was especially neat to see that people of all walks of life can be seen on a bicycle at almost every hour of the day and night. Old people, young people, hippies, yuppies, business elites in full suits, crazy Lance Armstrong-like cyclists- all kinds of folks! It's like being in Holland, though I've never been myself, I've heard many Dutch people describe it. I took a rest day in Portland before heading off towards the coast to complete my quest to cross the country!

Oh yeah, here's one final picture of that busted rim I mentioned in my last post. So far so good and less than 100 miles to go!



Well... the weather has been beautiful... the winds have been calm today! I think I'll stop just shy of Astoria, OR and camp in a state forest tonight, saving seeing the Pacific until the exact end of Week Number 10. I'm not too sure what I'll do when I reach the coast... I might just turn around and go back the other way...

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