Day 4: Crow Butte Park to Pendleton

May 11, 2015

This was one of those days that cyclists dream about. We awoke to a pleasant symphony of owls hooting. The air was cool but not cold. The only thing that put a bit of a damper on the morning was discovering that both we and Amy were out of fuel, so there would be no coffee before leaving camp. On the other hand, it helped in our goal of getting on the road earlier than previous days.

I had read from several other journals that the hosts don't charge bicyclists to camp here, and that appears to still be the case. Maybe. One host said that the other would come around to collect our fee, but no one ever showed up. The board at the campground states that tent camping is $15/night. I would say to future visitors to either call for clarification or just expect to pay the tent rate.

The Lewis and Clark Highway continued to be smooth, with little traffic heading east. We finally were stopped by a repaving project. The flagger didn't signal for us to approach, so we stood in line with the cars and trucks. The truck in front of us carried a trailer with a very annoyed bull. We watched nervously as the bull huffed and stomped in apparent resentment at our presence. We blamed his behavior on my red jersey. Finally after a few minutes we decided to move forward of our own accord, and sure enough, the beast calmed down.

The miles really flew by, and we navigated the maze that leads across the bridge to Umatilla. In Hermiston we were looking forward to eating lunch and running some errands, in that order. We encountered a Walmart and decided that we'd better stop to see if it had fuel canisters for Amy's Jetboil, No such luck. OK, great, that means it's lunch time!

We stopped at the local bike shop, where we discovered that we were the first bike tourists of the season to come through, We stocked up on spare tubes, and Amy bought a spare tire and some dog repellent. Hopefully she won't have to use the Halt, but it has since become the inspiration for many jokes involving poisonous bunnies and vicious lap dogs.

I have a feeling that the highlight of our tour, as far as pure riding enjoyment is concerned, is the road between Hermiston and Pendleton. We expected it to be a bit of a slog, but gorgeous scenery combined with having the wind at our backs, put us in seventh heaven. By the time we reached Pendleton, we were a bit sad that it was all over despite the fact that we had just logged over 70 miles.

We had a great meal at Great Pacific, and headed to our host's house. Although we had to climb a steep hill to reach it, we were greeted warmly and were taken care of very well. I was a bit worried about how this whole shuttle thing was going to work out. We all agreed that we should catch the 5:08am bus so as to cause the least amount of trouble and give us time to come up with a Plan B should this service not work out as promised.

See Amy's nervous smile? It was funny but not fun to wait behind this bull.

This marker was just on the other side of the I-82 bridge across the Columbia at Umatilla. I think it's neat because it's a stencil cutout.

Leaving Scott's Cycle and Sports in Hermiston with new spare tubes, tire, and dog spray. Scott is a real character! We really enjoyed chatting with him.

An old barn along Despain Gulch Road. We should have taken more pictures but we were just flying along, and had no desire to break the momentum.

Today's ride: 73 miles (117 km)
Total: 257 miles (414 km)

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