The epic day of riding...

So, as I mentioned earlier, I had forgotten my toiletry bag in seattle and had it shipped to one of our destinations. It was scheduled to arrive three days later than the night we stayed there (due to miscommunications between the residence hall staff where I left the item). At any rate, the package was now scheduled to arrive monday, and I somehow decided that it would be a good idea to back-track 50 miles to chase it down, and rejoin the group later that evening. Our camp manager, Bill Denharder (who I now refer to as 'Uncle Bill') offered to drive back from Kennewick to Sunnyside to get the package, but I declined the offer because I wasn't 100% certain that the package would be there, and I didn't want someone else to have to do my 'dirty work'. Plus I figured his could become an epic day to be remembered for weeks and months too come...

So I plotted out my route and determined that the roundtrip mileage would be roughly 150 miles - this sounds like a lot, but I had previously done 175 miles through the French Alps, so I figured this was managable. I then sarcastically asked a few friends to join me on the adventure, and Nick was the first to take the bait. Then before we went to bed, Nick and I talked with Josh and convinced him to come as well. I was very happy to have such good company, because here's how the day went:

We started out at 7am (for the first time ever I was one of the first riders to leave!) and were met by a good headwind, but managed to reach Sunnyside by 9:30. We camped out at the school to which I had sent my package, and from there I searched around town for the UPS truck. I finally found it around 11am, but the driver kindly informed me that my package was in a different truck which was currently in the next town over, and not scheduled to arrive until 2-4pm. So we saddled up again and biked another 8 miles in the wrong direction to meet the driver at a gas station (this was kindly pre-arranged by the first driver I met). We stocked up on water, and I bought the guys lunch, and we finally got the package around 12:30pm. From this point, we had 108 miles to go to our final destination. We cruised on a slight downhill for an hour, then hit a good 1000ft climb in the heat of the day, with no shade whatsoever. Upon reaching the summit we could see for over 10 mile - rolling hills of wheat fields. We continued south toward the Columbia River into another good headwind. We were moving along at a pretty good clip, and there was even a chance that we were going to beat the sweep team in. But then we stopped at a state park and took some pictures before beginning the final climb of the day. We had just enough food and water to deliver us safely back to camp, and we arrived just in time for the nightly peloton meeting, where we shared the experience of our day with the group. Here's a little re-cap of Monday's riding statistics:

Total mileage: 176 miles
Total riding time: ~9hrs10mn
Average speed: ~19.5
Water bottles consumed: 21

Be sure to check out the Sea-to-Sea site: www.seatosea.org, they did a short interview with us three and said they'd post it on the website soon.

Anyway, it was great to get cleaned up again and have all my necessities... I guess the no-shower, no-deodorant routine has finally come to an end - maybe now i'll make more friends!

Monday's ride was beautiful. I think some of the old CRC folks might have fretted some since we went through Hell's Canyon, but we all came out alive! I was once again one of the first ones in camp after leaving later - the 176 miles didn't slow me down too much today!

Today we rode another easy 50 miles, and are now in Baker City - the same city where I had a stage race one week prior to joining the tour. We finished early and our now watchin The Tour on tv at the local watering hole. this may become a ritual over the next few weeks as the Tour de France continues.

Until next time...

Cheers!