Day Eighteen - Cheese, Climbing and Crashing

Day Eighteen – Cheese, Climbing and Crashing.

Seaside to Lincoln City

Daily Brief

The day was marked with three major climbs, lunch at a cheese factory, a swift 20 miles in an hour, climbing for fun, a crash, and splitting up at night for the first time.

The Ride

We started the day by filling up on an all you can eat continental breakfast. We stuffed our faces again eating our weight in breakfast food. It was hard to leave the hotel, it cost the same as the local youth hostel, but came with two rooms, two bathrooms, 2 plasma TV’s, a washer and dryer and a fully functional kitchen. In other words, sometimes you can get the hook up when you’re doing a 2,600 mile bike trip for charity and it’s the off season in a tourist town.

The day was smooth riding. With a small chill in the air it was pleasant. The weather has been good to us. It’s not been too warm except for a couple days in Idaho. We had some great views, stopping every so often to look out over the ocean. The first 50 miles flew by and we took lunch at a cheese factory, Tillamook. We were all disappointed in the portions when the supreme grilled cheese sandwich turned out to be a glorified middle school cafeteria meal. At least we found out how they store all that cheese, and watching the assembly line of cheese just made me want to gnaw on a giant cube of cheese and put on mice ears…ok, not really, I would never wear mice ears.

After lunch we busted out a quick 20 miles in about an hour. We still had one sizable climb in front of us, we had already taken out the other two in the morning. Before we made it to the last climb we stopped for a moment so Bob could clean up his cuts. We had been going around a corner when his front tire clipped Chris’s back tire and he had gone down on his side. Thankfully he was alright and was on the bike in just a few moments. We made it to the support van and he cleaned up his scratches and we took a moment to snack and recollect ourselves.

From where we stopped we could see an intense uphill driveway on the left side of the road. It was the steepest bit of road we’ve seen this trip. Shaun bet Chandler that he couldn’t make it up it. Chandler lobbied for more bets and got another $20.00 from his mom in the pot. So, he got a good start and hit the hill fast. In about 12 seconds he made it to the top. It was so steep he walked his bike back down to save his brakes…and so he wouldn’t go over the front handle bars. He then gave Shaun a double or nothing option if he could make it up the hill. Shaun took the challenge. His first attempt was foiled by his bike that wouldn’t shift properly. After some adjustments he attacked the hill again and finally made it up. You know we must be starting to feel good when we start going up hills just for fun, or at least for money.

After the climbing for fun, we had some climbing to get to the top. After summiting our last hill, we waited a moment near the top, or at least Chris and Parry did. Chandler had already started down. You will never find Chandler waiting at the top of a long and fast downhill run. You can find him at the bottom, but never the top. The downhill run was long, and Chris and Parry started to cramp up just staying in bicyclist dive bomber positions. For those of you unfamiliar with this position or the sensation associated with it, you can re-experience it yourself. Just go the top of the steepest hill around, pedal as fast as you can all the way down it, and hug the top metal crossbar of your bike with your chest while doing so. You’ll know you’ve made it when thoughts like, “what will happen to me if I get a flat right now?” or “gee, this would be a bad way to go” start entering your mind.

After the last long downhill it was smooth sailing into Lincoln City. We split up as to where we were going to sleep since Bob needs the internet for some business tomorrow. He got a hotel and Shaun and Parry crashed with him. Chandler, Chris, and Bonnie went camping nearby. This was the first time we split up at night. It will be a long night, but I think we’ll survive.

Daily Stats

Distance: 95.9
Time: 6:19
Avg Speed: 15.2
Max Speed: 40.2

Total Distance: 1297.8

P&C Pushups: 140