I’ll bet it’s been over three years since we last took today’s ride, a loop east up the Columbia to Blue Lake and then south on the Fairview-Gresham Trail before returning to town along the Springwater Corridor.  This is another of our regular rides that we’d take periodically until the worsening situation on Springwater shut it down for us.  It’s the first ride that came to my mind to try once we found it felt fine to bike out to Gresham again.

We backed our way into this decision by trying to figure out the lunch plan.  We knew we wanted to have lunch at the waterfront McCormick and Schmick’s restaurant, sitting outside watching the scene and maybe listening to sounds from the Blues Festival waft our direction, so we were looking for a right-sized, right difficulty ride that gets us to the waterfront around noon before the day gets too hot.  The Fairview Loop fit our specs perfectly.

We’re up early, have coffee and a light breakfast, and are ready to bike by eight.  One problem though - I can’t find our cable lock, which we’ll need to secure the bikes during our meal.  I must have left it in one of the panniers from Italy, which went back to the storage locker after we arrived.   So the day starts with a stop-off to pick it up, which is fortunately right on route and hardly holds us up.

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We’ve seen most of this loop here recently except for the Fairmont-Gresham connector, and since we’re on a mission to get to our meal on time I’m not inclined to hold us up for many photos.  Fortunately Rachael thought to bring her GoPro along, or we wouldn’t have much to show for today’s show and tell.

Video sound track: Bright Moments, by Grover Washington, Jr.

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We do have one reason to stop though.  We’ve just climbed up from Blue Lake through Fairview on busy, noisy NE 233rd, when I hear something from Rachael and look back to see she’s stopped about a half-block behind me with the phone out.  She doesn’t usually stop for calls when we’re riding, but this is an important one - it’s the passport office, calling to confirm our appointment to get our passports renewed Thursday.  It’s a real stroke of luck that we’re just out of the traffic noise so she can hear the ringtone, and that she’d previously programmed the number in from when we made the appointment so its name comes up on the screen and she knows it’s vital to answer.  Who knows?  With a little less luck we might have had our appointment cancelled, which of course would be disastrous.

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We make it to the restaurant at 12:10, just after it opens for lunch.  They’re still setting up the outside tables, so our names get put on a waiting list and we sit for about ten minutes until our names are called.  It’s a good thing we got here as early as we did, because in another ten minutes the outdoor tables are all occupied.  There’s plenty of seating indoors, but it’s so much nicer outside here that it would be a shame to miss and we’d worry about our bikes.

I could show you some photos of our meal, I suppose: the chopped salad we split as a starter, or Rachael’s bourbon salmon or my rockfish, or the Boneyard IPA that pairs perfectly with an hour spent in the shade of the restaurant with a light breeze cooling us off on a day that will top 90 before it’s done.  Or I could have taken a video of folks strolling, biking and skating past our table as the blues band plays on in the background.  But I don’t want to make any ex-Portlanders feel homesick so I’ll stop here.

There’s a bit more to say about the day though.  We bike home along the waterfront after finishing our meal, adding just enough extra distance to bring us up to a good number for the day’s outing.  A half hour later I’m relaxing on the couch catching up on the blogs when the phone rings.  Rachael listens in puzzlement for a minute and then hands it to me.

It’s an agent from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, calling from El Paso to ask about a package they’ve intercepted that’s addressed to me.  A stack of fake ID’s supposedly belonging to me are in it, and from their research so far illegal drugs and money laundering are involved too.  Was I expecting a package from Mexico or Columbia, and have I been to either of those countries or to Texas recently?  If not, they suspect that they’ve got at least an identity theft case on their hands.

The first thing that comes to mind is the lost wallet, which I tell them about.  The officer I’m speaking with gives me his name, badge number, and a case number and then hands me off to his superior, who takes it up from there.  Yolanda starts laying out the alternatives - I could get a criminal attorney or I could speak with a marshal about alternative non-judicial resolutions, while Rachael in the background is gesticulating and mouthing scam which I’m also already suspecting.  And this suspicion seems confirmed when Rachael looks up ICE and scam, and finds the warning on their website to be wary of just something like this.

And it does seem like it’s a scam, because when I mention this to Yolanda she hangs up instantly and the phone shows I’ve been speaking with an unlisted number.

But who knows?  I did recently lose my wallet and drivers license after all, and maybe I’m bound for the penitentiary.  If so, you’ll be among the first to know; and if I’m allowed to keep my iPad, given access to the internet, and can use a stationary bike on my recreation breaks we’ll keep this thing going somehow.