Good news! I comported myself just well enough yesterday to earn a second date, so Rachael agrees that I can ride out to Sauvie Island with her this morning. Another hot one is in store so we plan an early start. I open up Lovejoy Bakery at 6 and am back home before 8:30, ready to roll. I told Rachael I planned to leave the cameras behind today and just ride; but as we prepare to leave I grab them at the last minute, just on principal. Every time I step out the door without a camera and see something I want to remember I get mad at myself for my short-sightedness.
Sunday morning is our favorite time to bike out to Sauvie. The island is great any time, but it’s a ten mile highway ride getting there. On Sunday mornings the highway isn’t bad at all though - in particular, there’s hardly any truck traffic. This early in the morning, the air still feels cool and fresh. With that and the minimal traffic on the highway, this part of the ride is as pleasant as you can hope for.
Once on the island, we separate almost immediately when I spot something of interest. I say that I’ll catch up six miles down the room at the WC stop (I understand that the proper term for these roadside facilities is now a Garceau, for some reason I don’t quite get).
Three photo stops later, it’s obvious that I’m not going to catch up with her after all. Now that I only make it out here a few times a year there is just too much to see and take in, and I don’t want to rush through the show. I give Rachael a call and tell her to go on ahead without me and I’ll meet her at the bridge at the end of the island so we can bike home together. Sauvie Island actually works really well for us in this way, because it includes a ten mile out-and-back spur that gives me all the latitude I need to catch up with her before we leave the island. She gets a good, fast workout; I have the freedom to poke around at my own pace and stop when something catches my attention; and we can bracket the island loop with the 11 mile ride out to and back from the island to downtown Portland. Win-win.
Everything goes to plan, and we meet up near the bridge an hour later. Not far from town though, we split up again. I experience the start of an SVT episode, the first in quite some time, and decide I should stop and lie down for a few minutes until it passes. We agree that she should just continue on, and I’ll meet her back at the apartment. A few minutes later, I’m up and moving again; but then, a few miles later I’m down again - eight blocks from home, I get a flat tire and walk the rest of the way in. This is the same tire that flattened twice on the Canadian tour, so I guess the time really has come to get a replacement.
Andrea BrownI think they're hydrangea cuttings, we saw hydrangeas in the fields out there last week when we went blackberry picking. Reply to this comment 5 years ago
I wish I’d been faster on the uptake here. As they ran by, the lead runner shouted out her email address so I could mail them a photo; but I didn’t understand in time to pick up the complete address.
Scott AndersonTo Bruce LellmanSee! That’s why we need you to tour with us, Bruce. You’re much quicker on the uptake. It must be that younger brain thing. Reply to this comment 5 years ago
When I first started noticing this old structure, it was completely white. Year by year though it gets more exposed. I wonder how long it will be before we start seeing it’s roof start to sag?
Amazing. After all these years biking the island, today is the first time I’ve noticed this waterway that crosses under Reeder Road. The is the fourteen mile long Gilbert River, that rises by the base of the bridge and empties into Sturgeon Lake at the north end of the island.
Oregon White Oak is one of the signature trees in the Willamette Valley. Some of them are really spectacular, standing isolated in open fields. I see that these are known as the Garry Oak in Canada.
This is the second of a pair that dashed across the road, holding up traffic. I saw it coming - they were standing atop the dike bordering Multnomah Channel, watching for a break in the traffic.
I haven’t been in the Rogue Public House for a long time, but I like its industrial decor. I hadn’t planned to come here, but it’s in walking distance and I didn’t feel like repairing my flat today.
