September 17, 2023
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In the cool, still, silent morning I hoist the tent high in the air, the mesh still hung on the poles, trying to shake out every last bit of dirt. I have no idea when I’ll sleep in it again.
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The boat pounds over chunky, wind-blown seas on the quick trip back to Orcas. From the head of the dock I pedal south into the wind and snag the last breakfast sandwich at a cafe, then rush out of Eastsound. The ferry that runs between the islands is canceled all day, so instead of a short sail back to Friday Harbor it’s an hour to Anacortes on the mainland and then another hour back to the islands. If I make the next ferry I’ll still be home before dinner, so I get after it.
A few miles up the road I pull off and lean the bike against a tree and find the foil-wrapped sandwich buried in my pannier. It’s my first warm food in a few days and I’m all deep breaths and happy sounds.
It’s not so happy after that. There are lots of cars again, all headed for the same ferry I want to catch. It’s pedal slow up a steep hill and then speed down the other side, over and over. It doesn’t seem to anyone else like I’m racing toward some big finish line as I wobble uphill at four miles per hour, but that’s how it feels.
I don’t know for sure if I’m on track to make it or not — the timing is close enough I stop only for short breaks — but when I crest the last hill I see the tops of the ferry smokestacks on the other side and they’re moving slowly toward shore.
The ferry pulls into Anacortes. I walk the bike off the ferry, get to the top of the ramp, turn around, wait for all the cars and their fart clouds of exhaust to speed past, then walk the bike back onto the same boat, and the ferry rattles and shakes and rumbles again to the west.
Family and home wait for me in Friday Harbor, but only after I’ve crested the top of what might be the steepest hill of the trip. Cranking slow and breathing hard, I think back on the week just past. There’s much to recall and reflect upon — the quiet coastlines, the still morning fog, valley roads lined by farms, weak legs growing stronger, peaceful nights.
Yet in that moment, it turns out that the thing standing out the most in my mind is, in fact, the food. Or really, the food that wasn’t — no pizza or burgers or candy bars or soda or fried blobs of meat with the texture of rubber. If you’d told me a decade ago that this was my future, I wouldn’t have believed you.
It’s one more piece of evidence added to a growing stack, the contents of which point toward only one verdict: this boy is all grown up.
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1 year ago
Welcome back to touring and thanks for sharing once again.
8 months ago