Ilwaco, Washington to Cannon Beach, Oregon: Busted, flat, in Cannon Beach

December 13, 2012

It's only a short hop from Ilwaco to the bridge over the Columbia River mouth, to Astoria, Oregon. We planned it that way, because we wanted to hit the bridge when we fresh and when there was lots of light.

The Grampies reach the Columbia. Off to the right we see breakers at the river mouth

If you can read this, it's interesting stuff about early exploration of the river mouth.

This bridge is notorious with coastal cyclists for three pretty good reasons. First, it's at least 6 kilometers long. Then, there is no shoulder, and finally it incorporates a hell of a hill at the end, as it is built high to allow ships to pass underneath.

In fact, the bit about the shoulder is overstated. There is about a two foot one. We are used to riding narrower than that, but there is a catch. To the right of the shoulder is a concrete curb. If you have low rider front panniers, as we do, you have to shove your wheel over a foot, making the real shoulder effectively a foot or foot and a half wide. Sticking to that for 6 km and up the hill makes up the challenge of this bridge.

Once you make it over, there is a second, similar bridge over to Warrenton, but it is way shorter and has no hill. Just before that bridge, the Oregon Department of Transport has a display extolling its Coast Bicycle Route. The display offers a take away map/pamphlet that describes the 595 km of the route in a lot of interesting detail. This is a map we did not know about, and is a good companion to our cycling the coast book and the ACA maps. The pamphlet also describes a book devoted to just cycling the Oregon coast, and a web site as well.

Oregon Department of Transport Bike Route map

In Warrenton we came to our first Fred Meyer store. This is a Walmart like chain in Oregon. Dodie went in and came back with grapes, cheese, muffins. Hooray. While I was waiting outside with the bikes three people came up and, clearly responding to the Canadian flags on the bikes, just welcomed me and wished us a good time. Nice.

From Warrenton the road leads through Seaside. Seaside is the first of the ultra cute tourism oriented towns along the coast. We love these places, but this time we did not turn off 101 and go into town. Our excuse was not enough daylight left so no dawdling, but it could be that this time we feel ourselves here more to cycle than to look. We told ourselves we will do this again in Summer, and hang out more.

From Seaside it's an easy cruise over to Cannon Beach, our target. There is only one real hill in the way, and it is not really all that big compared to some that we know are coming. We cranked slowly up it, and then swooped down into Cannon Beach, exiting 101 and heading for the main street of town.

All this swooping came to a very abrupt end when we swooped into a muddy patch on the road. Dodie, clearly a more accomplished cyclist, skidded a little and went through. I, though, never knew what hit me. The bike skittered out the right, and I skittered out to the left, into the road. As I flew through the air, in that long split second, I watched my camera leave my pocket and head for the pavement ahead of me. Darn, I thought, that camera was a gamble when I bought it because it seemed pretty fragile. I hit the pavement, behind the camera, and pretty soon was trying to shout up ahead to Dodie, to come rescue me.

An oncoming City works driver stopped, and blocked traffic with his truck. Dodie ran back up the hill. She points this out proudly, as she is now not much of a runner due to bad knees.

Fortunately, there was not much harm done. I ripped my new Icebreaker cycling pants, and scraped up one knee. The side of the front tire was abraded, and the tire went flat. That was a strange one, because it was not that the tire got ripped off the rim, allowing the tube to explode. Rather, the tube just got a new standard puncture. Weird.

The mud that got me, and the truck that blocked traffic while Dodie scraped me off the highway.

The bike and I both literally limped into town. Though we have spare tubes,we bought another at the bike shop and installed it there.

The coastal towns feature shake roofs, and cedar shake or siding exteriors. It's all very very cute and pleasant

In the motel room, the knee got cleaned up, and antibiotic ointment put on. Dodie complained that I had not photographed the injury, though I always immortalised hers. So, some hours later, I snapped the scene.

Tomorrow, right off, there seems to be two even bigger hills. Probably we will be coming down those a bit slower!

p.s. The camera came through fine!

PHOTO GALLERY

This tree started off in the forest to the left, took out the guard rail, and part ended here on the right.

Going up the hill before Cannon Beach we found this sticker on the guard rail. We have yet to check out the web site to see if the guy made it.

Today's ride: 67 km (42 miles)
Total: 474 km (294 miles)

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