Day 0 - The Drive
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 mask on so I didn't have to smell the smoke. 20 miles later, it started clearing up, and it's pretty darn clear now.
Here's a screenshot of the air quality map. The Cedar Creek Fire on Route 58 is at the top, smoky Bend, OR is to the right of that, Klamath Lake is at the bottom (AQI=29), and Crater Lake is right there in the middle, with a AQI reading of 25. Maybe we'll get a blue lake after all.
I have too much stuff in my packs and I'll have to figure out what I don't really really need, and leave it in the car tomorrow.
Glad you're doing this trip and wish I could come along. Thanks for doing the Blog- Crater Lake is a place I'd love to visit sometime- and a bike seems like the way to do it. I guess we'll find out!
ReplyDeletere gear- that's a tough one. With the San Diego trip that Brian and I did we were pretty certain of finding food most days so we really just needed oatmeal, coffee, and granola bars in order to have some food for a day or two. I carried my normal one person camping gear and we both had a stove. We ended up using my stove with a propane cannister most because it's easy. Biggest equipment problems were my air mattress getting multiple punctures from those evil goatshead thorns! Next time I'll check and see if I'm riding in goathead thorn country and if I am I'll take my z-rest pad. Also, my rack broke but we were able to kludge it with bungee and tie wraps. Take them (I know I'm writing this too late to be of any help at all :-).
ReplyDeleteI found myself in the "unsure" mode and carried food I didn't need to. Got the propane stove, works great, and had coffee and oatmeal to start every day. I didn't blog-whine but my new 2" mattress that I had test-camped didn't hold air at the Klamath Falls start, so I had to buy another at start of Day 1.
ReplyDelete(Also, I revised Day 0 with the AQI map referred to in the text.)