The Wheel Dip

Day 0        Astoria-Pacific Ocean-Astoria

Miles:  26.10                 Terrain:  Relatively flat 
Depart:   10:02  AM      Arrive:  12: 23 PM
Riding time: 1:45:29        
Average Riding Speed:  14.8

           Today’s Garmin Download (for cycling data junkies!) 

                              Today's Ride 

Today’s ride start seemed just like any riding day of a group tour.  After a busy early morning assembling our bikes, we headed out of the hotel, crossed the Young’s Bay on the old bridge (the one with less traffic) and headed over to Fort Stevens Park.  For about a mile we followed a very nice path through the woods until we broke out into a parking lot.  And that’s when it sinks home—the water at the end of that beach is the Pacific Ocean.  Finally, after all these years of wanting to do this, I’m about to dip my rear wheel to mark the start of a coast-to-coast trip on my bicycle!  Everyone took of their bike shoes and then carried their bikes down a short hill on the beach and to the water.  I briefly thought about what was about to begin, but then helped a few other people by using their cameras to take their pictures.  Focusing on that, the excitement ebbed, and soon we were back on the way to the hotel.  All told it was a 26-mile round trip that always seemed to be into the wind (isn’t that always the way it works?) on roads that generally had bike lanes.

Breakfast starts at 6:00 am tomorrow, luggage into the van at 7:00 am, and then we have a 65 mile ride to St. Helen’s, Oregon.  Easy directions—leave the hotel, go left on route 30, turn right into the hotel! So it’s time to get packed up and get a good night sleep for the first push eastward toward New Hampshire.