Crater Lake Rewirement Tour

  Dateline September 18 (you may notice a few more words in this post as I am typing on my computer at home...) After getting back to our campsite, we all had a reality check. Mine was pretty bleak. I was equipped for summer mountain weather, but not extended wet weather. My tent is a one-person lightweight with not much vestibule. This is a one-season tent, and with a little addition of seam sealer, the inside will stay dry next time. I didn't bring a tarp for cooking or being outside the tent. I didn't bring gloves or pants for rain-riding. And the forecast for the remainder of Saturday and Sunday was more that summer showers. I had a big blind spot for the weather I could really expect at the beginning of fall at 6000'. I think I need to rewire that thinking. Continuing the tour north and east around Crater Lake seemed like a miserable prospect. And why circumnavigate the park after circumnavigating the Rim? Katie and John were also not wanting to sit in the tent for the...

(Dateline September 17) time on the bike miles average speed maximum speed. We went to bed last night after hearing a forecast of possible frozen precipitation after 2:00 on the ride day. So we wanted to start riding by 9:00 at the latest and beat that by about a half an hour. We unpacked the three bikes out of the back of the Subaru at the lodge parking lot and went to take our obligatory starting photo. We ran into these guys from the Bay Area that were riding the whole route on fixed gear bikes! Awesome! Katie took their photo for them and they took ours. Katie, John M and John G So today was not going to be the crystal clear blue sky blue lake day. We were geared for the cold as temperature at the campground was in the mid 30s. But nonetheless, the magnitude and scope of Crater Lake was amazing! These pictures in this format won't do it justice but here's a sample: Here's a map of the rim ride and below that, the profile of the ride. You may be able to zoom in and see t...

Song of the day: John Cash "I Walk The Line". Just the chorus.  6 pm: Looks like the wi-fi at the campground store will do just fine. I didn't know Dr Bronner's turn milky when it got cold. The first 6 miles led me through the Farmland north of Fort Klamath. This hawk was annoyed with me and kept flying from pole to pole ahead of me.  So I did find that the mountain that crater lake was former from is named Mt. Mazama. And all these peaks were part of it... Farming! Gotta love it, one of these guys woke me up last night, because he sounded like my phone on vibrate! Obligatory shot of the park entrance, I have a lot of these. This is Annie Creek, a deep valley that parallels the road. It took over two hours to do the 16 miles to campground. Lots of low gear... Tomorrow should be easier without the load, but longer, and steeper. Gotta run back to camp and cook dinner with Katie and John (friends from work).  See you tomorrow!

 So it got a little cold last night in Fort Klamath, and the skies were crystal clear. The Milky Way was as wonderful as I have ever seen it. This post is to let you know that there may not be cell service or Wi-Fi at Crater Lake. It may be more than a day before I update.

Susan of Susan and Brian authored the first extended blog with their trip across the Northern Tier from in Anacortes to Virginia. Susan set the standard, sorry, I want thinking back far enough. KOA in Klamath Falls had clean bathrooms. That's the best thing I can say about KOA. Brian, my riding song today was Creedence Clearwater Revival  doing something like "da da da da da dada, I see the light". You know. Hey I just played the guitar, I didn't sing. But then I saw a forest service road number and got stuck on " in the year 2525". Here's the route I took today skirting the west side of Upper Klamath Lake, and passing the state and national wildlife refuges.  So in all that irrigation, where is the refuge? I took this photo before the road turn due north.  ( If you zoom in you can see the white pipes) As I got to Pelican Cove I saw, amazingly enough, a lot of pelicans! More than I have ever seen in the wild, fifteen or twenty. Unfortunately the picture ...

First, I have to think Brian and Tommy for their excellent examples of blogging about their Southern Tier bike trip. Should I do half as well, I'd be happy.  Okay, for some weird reason I was trying to avoid the use of a single occupancy car to do this trip. Go down on the train, bike, do the ride, bike more, come back on the train. But instead I'm driving up Snoqualmie Pass on the way to Oregon.  Just a week ago I had a half loaded ride up the rail bed from Cedar Lake to the abandoned train tunnel at Snoqualmie Pass. It was Labor Day, and everybody and their kids were enjoying the tunnel at the top. It's easily accessible from the Hyak ski area. This State Park trail goes all the way across Washington that would be a fun adventure sometime. This highway sign says it all. Psychedelic font too. Other engineers, explain. I'm rewired, I don't need to. The haze/smoke got more noticeable in Yakima and increased as I drove south. Bend was pretty nasty and I put my n95 mas...

 It has been a few weird months, and weeks...  After considering and committing to a retirement date, I was sorting around for ride ideas and friends to go along. In March I was in a conversation with a certain cyclist friend (Brian) where I suggested a redux trip around the Olympic Peninsula. It was gently suggested there might be cool rides in Oregon.  Taking the hint, I let the internet do some searching and among a lot of possibilities, I ran across Ride the Rim, two one-day events run on the second and third Saturdays of September. On each Saturday, the eastern 3/4 of the road around Crater Lake is closed to auto traffic, and +2000 cyclists check out the views from the rim, and ride down one valley and up to the next viewpoint... ~4000' of climbing in 34 miles. Somehow this ride caught my interest. I haven't seen Crater Lake since Nate was 2. And I thought a one day event is not enough good stuff for the effort to get there and back. If only there were a way to bike-...