Day 3 - Leavenworth, WA to Coulee City, WA

Weather
Temperature: 90°F
Conditions: Mostly Sunny
Wind: S 9 mph

Ride Info
Altimeter Trip: 4,580 ft
Altimeter Odometer: 10,220 ft
Maximum Speed: 39.5 mph
Average Speed: 16.8 mph
Distance Trip: 82.9 miles
Distance Odometer: 208.8 miles
Elapsed Time: 4 hr 34 min 02 sec

My alarm clock didn’t wake me up this morning. I woke up to some helicopters flying low overhead. Not sure where they came from or what they were doing. It got pretty chilly last night, but I stayed nice and comfy in my sleeping bag. Supposedly, it’s rated down to 0°F. After breakfast, we were soon on the road. I rode with Chip and Jim again today. Even though it started out fairly cool, it quickly warmed up.

There were some pretty good hills to climb, and I was still feeling pretty good after yesterday’s ride. One thing I was worried about was how well my body would adapt to riding the mileage I was riding day in and day out. I think because riding my bike was the “only” thing I was doing, my body had a chance to recover every day.

The terrain changed quite a bit as we left Leavenworth. It changed from lush pine forests to “semi-desert”. As a matter of fact, once we hit Orondo (and grabbed some lunch), the scenery changed dramatically. There was a good five mile or so climb heading east out of Orondo. The scenery was something out of a Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote cartoon - barren rock, shear cliffs, and sparse vegetation. Jim must have been feeling pretty good because he was pushing hard. I was able to keep on Jim’s wheel, but Chip was not able to keep up. Jim and I were both going balls to the wall up the hill, trading attacks, with the other person catching up and counterattacking. I made sure that I “won” the sprint to the top of the hill as I didn’t want to be beaten by “some 60 year old guy”.

Our effort up the hill was rewarded with dramatic scenery on the way down. We entered what I dubbed “The Valley of Death”. Picked some good speed on the hill heading down into the valley and carved a sweet turn at the bottom of the hill. Jim and I stopped to take some pictures at the bottom and rested a little. Chip had caught up and we all hung out, took a leak, and rested some more. Chip and Jim wanted to take it easy the rest of the way into Coulee City. I really wanted to pound the pavement hard some more, so I pressed on ahead of Chip and Jim. That was a mistake as I was quickly beaten down by the heat (temperature close to 90°F by that point) and my earlier efforts battling Jim. I decided to take it easy the last several miles into Coulee City.

Coach told us that there was a public park in town that had showers available. I was a little too eager to hit the showers because I ended up crashing heading into the park’s parking lot. The turn into the parking lot was at the bottom of a hill. I took it too fast into the turn, and my front tire slipped in a patch of loose gravel. CRASH!!! I was able to control my crash enough that I only scrapped my knee a little bit. More importantly, there was no damage to the bike. I spotted the changing rooms and hopped right in the shower. I never had a colder shower in my entire life. But it felt so good after such a hard effort on a hot day.

We stayed at a small church while it Coulee City. It was so small that Coach warned us not to overwhelm the bathrooms. He said, “Yellow’s mellow. If it’s brown, flush it down”. We were able to set up our bags and sleeping mats wherever we wanted. Most of us set up camp on the alter. Even though it was a hard day, it still surprised me how late some people would roll into camp. My elapsed time for the ride was 4.5 hours, and I probably spent 1.5 hours eating lunch, resting, taking pictures, etc. So that amounts to arriving at camp 6 hours after setting off. Some people wouldn’t show up to camp until 10 – 12 hours after departure. Oh well.

Tomorrow would be the first century (100 mile ride) of the trip. I was looking forward to seeing Spokane. It would be back to “civilization” and also so I could easily find a place to eat my second dinner.