Day One: You Probably Think I Quit Already

July 20, 2013

The Iron Horse Trail

This morning's schedule was for my wife, The Feeshko, to drive me and my bike from our hotel in Lynnwood to meet at Aaron's downtown Seattle apartment at 9:00 a.m. for a 10:00 a.m. departure. Stuck in the traffic jam that occurs daily on Interstate 5, we were running a little late so I texted Aaron to tell him so.

"No problem," he replied.

"It'll just be a couple more minutes," I added.

"That's OK. Take your time, nobody else is here yet."

"Really? But it's already 9:00."

"Yeah, but Alex and Tony just called. They'll be here shortly. They're bringing the Bloody Mary mix."

I had been riding all over Seattle with these guys for a couple of days now, so I shouldn't have been surprised that my tour was going to begin in the reckless style of the hip, urban cycling sub-culture. To them schedules aren't really something that must be adhered to.

The rest of the guys slowly began rolling in. They all had very good bicycles, but they weren't touring bikes. Only one of them had panniers; the rest carried their supplies in big messenger bags strapped over their shoulders.

The pre-ride Bloody Marys were only the beginning of a series of events that got us off to a slow start, but we did manage to start riding shortly after 11:00. At the outset we were a group of six.

From left to right: Ryan, Aaron, Max, Alex, Tony, and your correspondent, Greg.

Fifteen minutes later, we happened to run into another friend of the group named Barry. Barry yelled out, "Hey! Where are you guys going?"

One of the guys hollered back, "We're going up into the Cascades with Aaron's dad."

"Wait up," Barry shouted, "I'm coming too."

It only took Barry a few seconds to get rid of the girl he was with and less than ten minutes to pack up and join us. Now a group of seven, we got onto a trail that crosses Lake Washington alongside I-90.

A view of the Bellevue skyline across Lake Washington.

The bike path led us to Mercer Island where we hopped onto some local roads toward the other side of the island. That's where we ran into a pretty significant disaster.

A woman driving a minivan passed our group and then pulled over to the side of the road about 100 yards ahead. We quickly made up that distance and, suddenly, the van started making a U-turn right in front of us. Barry was in the lead, so he was the one who crashed into the car. Fortunately, our group was fairly scattered. If we had been closer together, we all would have crashed into the car in a chain reaction.

Barry was powerfully built and a strong bicycle rider. Like half of the young guys, he was not wearing a helmet and you could clearly see where his head put a big dent in the metal above the driver's side door. His body caved in the door itself and all the glass on the door was smashed out, much of it lodged in his right shoulder. If you saw the damage to the minivan you would never believe a bicyclist could have survived.

Aaron and his friends, each equipped with a disposable Kodak camera, took numerous pictures of one another posing with Barry. They were planning to put together a collage of pictures for a Merry Prankster-like experiment in artistic expression. (**Most of the photos on this page came from their collections.)

The body damage and smashed window of the minivan.

Beyond Barry is the woman who hit him and her husband. Also pictured are Alex, Ryan, a witness, me (partially hidden by the witness) and a Mercer Island policeman.

Ryan volunteered to write the police report.

Barry suffered some deep lacerations to his shoulder, a broken jaw, and a concussion. He seemed lucid the entire time, but the next day we learned that he remembered nothing of the crash. We stayed at the scene until the ambulance took Barry to the hospital. In a way, it seemed almost disrespectful to continue, but everybody agreed that we were on a mission.

Aside from the Bloody Marys, the filing of police reports and waiting for the ambulance, we were also delayed by some wrong turns and a couple of flat tires. (One of the drawbacks of riding with a group is that you kind of feel like you have to stop and wait for the tire to be repaired. One person's flat tire delay becomes everybody's flat tire delay.) Then there were beer stops at a couple of bars and a half-hour break at the beautiful Snoqualmie Falls. We picked and ate wild blackberries at the side of the road, and congratulated a wedding party in a park. It was all a great deal of fun, but I was concerned about our very slow rate of progress.

A nice place to perform a tire repair at Lake Sammamish.

Preparing to get back on the bikes after a couple of pitchers of Seattle's own Manny's Pale Ale.

Late in the afternoon, Tony and Max turned back to Seattle as they had to be back to work tomorrow morning. The rest of us continued out of the bustling metropolitan area, up into the Cascades. The big climbs were just starting. The young guys were always ahead of me, nowhere more so than in the mountains. I was getting very tired. I think they could have gone on all night. Finally we found our way to the Iron Horse Bike Trail which had a gentle uphill grade toward Snoqualmie Pass.

Approaching the heart of the Cascade Range.

Here we are along the Iron Horse Bike Trail. The sign appears to be a relic from the old railroad line, perhaps honoring one of my distant Spanish relatives.

Me, caught in the act, along the Iron Horse Trail. (No rivers or streams were polluted in the making of this photograph.)

There were signs along the trail saying, "Camping in Designated Areas Only," but, being that it was 9:30 p.m. and almost dark, we set up an illegal improvised campsite with no feelings of guilt. The views were magnificent. We made a little fire, grilled some salmon, drank beer, wine and whiskey, and enjoyed the night. Shenanigans ensued.

Ryan, wine, weed (legal in Washington) and DEET.

Ryan, Alex and Aaron horsing around by our illegal campfire at our illegal campsite.

Fun with flashlights and aluminum emergency blankets.

Today's ride: 57 miles (92 km)
Total: 57 miles (92 km)

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Scott AndersonOh, my gosh. What an awful way to start a tour. The photo of the bashed in door is really chilling. Did your friend recover well from his crash injuries?
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6 years ago

Gregory GarceauTo Scott AndersonYes, he recovered just fine. He was a strong guy, an athlete who did triathlons. In fact, despite their ragtag appearance, all of those young guys were exceptionally good cyclists. None of them own cars and they ride every day on those steep hills of downtown Seattle, delivering sandwiches, pizzas, documents, etc. Incredibly, almost all of them have been hit by a car at one time or another. My son has been hit twice. They shrug it off as being part of the business.
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6 years ago

Scott AndersonTo Gregory GarceauSo scary. I never really gave much thought to concussions until Rachael had hers.
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6 years ago

Gregory GarceauTo Scott AndersonI never really thought about them much either. I used to think it was just getting knocked on the head hard enough to make you dizzy for a while.

This incident was actually the second time I've dealt with a concussed bike rider after a crash. The first one was on an organized day ride where a rider hit a curb and went flying into the grass. His helmet was broken, he seemed a little dazed, and he had trouble getting up, so I called 911. It's so strange to be sitting there talking to a guy for several minutes and then finding out the next day that he doesn't remember a thing about it.
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6 years ago