Pacific Crest 1995, Medford to South Lake Tahoe

July 21, 1995 to July 31, 1995

This was the first of 6 tours on the Pacific Crest bike route (now called the ACA Sierra Cascades route) which roughly follows the Pacific Crest hiking trail from Canada to Mexico.

11 days, 541 miles (866 km).

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It was the first of 3 group tours I joined that were led by Bil Paul, the creator of the Sierra Cascades route. I was solo for the first 2 days, from Medford to the remote village of Hamburg, California.

This was my first time to see 14,179 foot Mt. Shasta. It had a tremendous amount of snow even in late July.

On this tour I also carried HF ham radio equipment. The results weren't as successful as in Hawaii. Fewer contacts, and only with the western U.S.

I appreciated that CA 89 is aligned to give a view of Mt. Shasta for miles.

On CA 89 with Mt. Shasta in the distance.

The highlight of the tour was cycling through Lassen National Park. Amazing volcanic terrain, plus very deep snow at the summit. I pedaled through Lassen again in 2009 and saw far less snow.

Deep snow at the road summit in Lassen National Park.

This was my first time to see Lake Tahoe. It's amazing. I enjoyed camping at the hiker/biker campground on the west shore of Lake Tahoe.

The cycling ended in the town of South Lake Tahoe. A bike shop packed and shipped the bike home via UPS. Then I walked across the state line to Harrah's casino and rode a bus to the Reno airport. The United Airlines check-in agent confiscated my liquid fuel Coleman stove even though the fuel was completely burned out.

The weather was reliably warm and sunny for the entire tour. I camped every night.

I liked this route enough that I pedaled most of it again 14 years later in the opposite direction during my California J tour.

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Charmaine RuppoltWow, I'm surprised that the United Airlines agent confiscated your Coleman stove, even though there was no fuel in it!
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7 months ago

Wayne EstesTo Charmaine RuppoltThe agent looked up the rules online. The rules say that stoves with attached fuel tanks are prohibited if the stove has EVER had fuel inside. I burned the fuel until it was out, and had flown with the stove a dozen round trips previously. But that didn't matter. I was also bummed that the replacement stove of the same model didn't work nearly as well as the one that was confiscated. My lesson learned was never voluntarily admit that a stove is in my luggage.
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7 months ago