This blog is not a mirage... we think...

Horse Heaven Hills, WA



Alana in Horse Heaven Hills, WA



Tired and dehydrated at the Gas station in Umitilla, OR




Camping in Pendleton, OR



Hello from Pendleton, a little town in northeastern Oregon!

We're taking a rest day in town today before tackling Blue Mountain - a climb from 1085ft to 4193ft over a distance of 20 miles. Our bodies and bikes decided that they needed a little TLC before taking that on!

The past few days have been good, but challenging. It's really hot and dry here - it's enough to keep ourselves hydrated and protected from the sun while resting in town, let along while biking! Our plan for tomorrow is to leave at 4:30 or 5am so that we can climb the majority of the hill before it gets too hot.

We've given in and started staying at camp sites because they're really the only patches of green grass to be had out here. And it's SO nice to be able to take a shower every night!!! =P While we were still in on the coast and the air was moist it wasn't such a big deal, but here it feels like we need to drink the water in through our skin.

The freeways and interstates are turning out to be the safest routes for us to ride on because the shoulders are nice and wide, and there are gas stations every once in a while. We had originally thought that we would be using the side roads, but it turns out that the one-lane roads rarely have decent shoulders to ride on, and the cars and trucks whip by at such speeds that it can be pretty scary sometimes. It's also so sparsely populated out here that along the side roads you rarely come across gas stations and markets where we can refill our water bottles. So, we're planning to stick to the main roads until just south of Boise, where we'll cut down into Nevada and across to Utah. That's the current plan! It tends to change quite frequently, though. =P

Anyway, we're having a great time! Pictures will hopefully be up a bit later today.

Oh yeah, and one more stat: yesterday we patched our 8th and 9th flat tires. Durrr!

Stats

Total Kms so far: 585kms

Day one: Vancouver to New Westminster, approx 30kms, broke the bikes and arrived at Ron and Lindas just in time for dinner.

Day two: New Westminster to Langley, Approx 40 kms...made it through Surrey without being hit by a car (there were a few close calls) and once again arrived just in time for dinner.

Day three: Langley to Acme, WA, Approx 75kms, camped on David and Tia's lawn.

Day Four: Acme to just south of Arlington, WA, Approx 84 kms, played with Dale the dog who like to roll in Robyn's used toothpaste.

Day Five:south of Arlington to North Bend, WA, Approx 85 kms, camped with the unnamed people with the giant ant hill and the blue kiddy pool. Well, they probably did have names but we didn't learn what they were.

Day six: North Bend to Cle Elum, WA, 94 kms, found the COWBOY RENDEZ VOUZ and hung with Jack, Happy Jack, and Cowboy Jack.

Day seven: Cle Elum, 0 kms, big fat Subway sandwiches!

Day eight: Cle Elum to Yakima, WA, 101 kms, camped on the bike route...saw the no camping signs after...really.

Day nine: Yakima to Grandview, 75 kms, hmmmmm...first shower is a bonus, carbonated DQ softserve...did you say banana????

Items sacrificed to the biking Gods (ie lost): 1 pair of sunglasses and one pair of bike gloves, 1/2 cone DQ softserve (did you say banana?)

Washington, it begins....

Robyn checking out the view near the Snoqualime Summit, WA



Our bikes at the Snoqualime Summit, WA



Camping at the Cowby Rendez Vous, Cle Elum, WA



Stealing Popcorn at the Cowby Rendez Vous, Cle Elum, WA



The river that we camped by in Yakima, WA



They let us across the border!!!!!



Fixing a flat



First "campsite", David and Tia's, Acme, WA



View from our tent near Arlington, WA



Third night in a backyard, North Bend, WA


So right now we are on a 30 min limit on the library internet in Grandview, Washington. It is so difficult to have internet access here, unless you have a laptop.

Well after getting our bikes fixed a Cap's we set off to Langley, hoping to make it to Horia's parents place before dark...which we did...just. We had our first flat in Surrey and there was some intellegent Surrey joke that was going to be made, but I have forgotten it so Surrey gets off easy this time.

The next day we easily crossed into Washington and headed down some back roads to Acme, where we were offered a place to camp in a local's backyard...which has become the way to go since it is a)free and b)there are like no campsites anywhere. After leaving Acme we headed just south of Arlington where we knocked on doors asking if we could pitch a tent it peopless backyards...we had one refusal, but the second lady was super nice and we hung out with her dog, Dale. The third day we made it to North Bend, the summit at Snoqualime worrying us for the next day.

After passing the summit at Snoqualime we kept going to the town of Cle Elum, where we happend to see the Cowboy Rendezvous and asked if we could camp at their rodeo type thing. We spent a rest day in Cle Elum, hangin with the cowboys! From Cle Elum to Yakima was our first 100km day, not too bad at all...we went through some hilly land and it is more like the Okanagan now - and probably hotter! The Yakima Canyon was gorgeous.

Near Yakima, we cheaped out again on a campsite...and could not find one anyway...and camped out beside a lake along the bike path (somewhat illegaly). Today we headed straight along the higway until Grandview where whe had our first shower since leaving Canada...yum! What is there to say about Grandview...its a town that can be missed...NOTHING happens...

Tommorow we are hoping to leave Washington and cross through the Horse Heaven Hills into Oregon. All in all we are a lot burnt, a little tired and having a great time. Photos will have to wait until we find a place to upload them.

Day 1 - Sandbags

Getting the Trailers packed up



Leaving New Westminster



Along 0 Ave to the border, Langley



Along 0 Ave to the border, Langley



An old barn, Langley



So, we're in... (drum roll please) ... New Westminster!

We left Alana's house at about 4:15pm on Monday after running around doing jobs. We had a few hiccoughs like a tire that wouldn't inflate, too much gear to fit in the trailers, etc. Once we finally got rolling and Alana was able to control the shaking of her bike/trailer we felt good. We rode about 30km out to the New Westminster Quay where the road was blocked by giant sand bags because of the high level of the Fraser river.

Being the brilliant minds that we are, we decided to simply haul the bikes over the sand bags. Ha. We seemed to have made it over successfully until we tried to leave and found that Alana's derailer had been smashed into her spokes and was caught there. After some wiggling we were able to release the trapped spoke and pulled the derailer back so that the bike could roll, but it needed to be fixed.

Fortunately, Alana's Aunt Linda and Uncle Ron (officially the nicest people in the world) live very near to the Quay, so we walked the 20min to their house and showed up just in time for dinner!

Because it was already 7:30pm by the time we got to the house, the only bike shop that we could get ahold of was the old hippie guy who lives in his shop down on 12th. He was not impressed but managed to straighten out the derailer enough to be able to shift (breaking a tool in the process which cost us an extra $10 - possibly because the tip of the wrench is still stuck in the derailer and we took it with us??). He called us later that night to tell us that we could probably get the tip out using a magnet, which was very thoughful of him. >=)

Anyhow, we took the bikes into Caps bike shop this morning and they are fabulous. They've fixed up the spokes and derailleur, and caught some more potential problems. (Alana's brakes were not installed properly and it turns out that most of my suffering is because my seat is too narrow for my wide ass bones - go figure! My derailleur was also a little bit bent.)

We'll get the bikes back at about 5:30pm and are hoping to make it to Langley where we'll spend the night at Horia's parents' house near to the border. That way we can cross into the US nice and early on Wednesday morning. That's the plan, anyway!

All things said and done, bending the derailleurs ("breaking the bikes", as Alana likes to say) was not such a bad thing. At least it got us into a proper bike shop which prevented some future problems. And when I think about the first two days of my bike trip in Argentina... we'd camped for the night in a field by a little stream and while we were making supper some gauchos rode by driving hundreds of sheep through the fence and across the road. When we got up to leave the next morning we realized that the sheep's hooves had turned the earth to thick clay mud which stuck to our tires so thickly that it clogged the space between the forks and tire so that the wheels wouldn't turn. So, then we had to haul the bikes and trailers through the muck and over the fences (which the gauchos had locked behind them) to the road. By the time we got there, the mud had cemented to the bikes so strongly that we had to hitchhike with the bikes and trailers all the way back to the town that we had started in to have them cleaned with a power washer. Compared to that, yesterday was a breeze!!

We'll post pictures when we can!

Leaving tomorrow!!!!

I think that we are going to leave tomorrow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yeah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!