Great days with a few hiccups

We have been off the grid for a couple of days, but we are back to the connected world.

The Three Sisters

What an interesting day we had Friday.  It started off fairly normal.  Nicholas went for his training run while we packed up the RV, did dishes, walked the dog, took care of dumping the waste tanks, filling the water tank, unhooking the utilities and getting the bikes ready to go.  It was a scheduled 84 mile ride from Sisters to Mitchell, OR.  Nicholas was going to ride the first 35 miles with me while Beth drove the RV.  Then we would have lunch in Prineville and switch drivers.  Beth and I would ride the tandem over Ochoco Pass to Mitchell to spend the night in the little "city park"... Mitchell has less than 250 residents, but 3 RV hookups in their park for $17/night and it is a long ways to anything else.

Anyway, things went well to start.  It was a beautiful day with clear blue skies and only a little chilly for the first part of the ride.  After 27.5 miles, Nicholas decided to get in the RV.  That is his longest personal ride on a bike, so that was pretty good for only his second time out with us.  Beth thought about switching to the tandem there, but I said why not just drive the 8 miles to Prineville and she could get ready while I rode into town, then we would ride from there.

 

I had also asked Beth to keep an eye out for a place to fill the propane tank on the RV.  We have been running the heater every night plus the water heater and refrigerator both use propane when we aren't plugged into land electrical power in an RV park.  She found propane in Prineville at a gas station and took care of filling the tank, but when she tried to park the RV to pay for the propane she accidentally backed into the car wash vacuuming station.  She checked for damage and didn't see any and went ahead to find a place to park for lunch while I rode into town.

I found them and we had a quick bite to eat.  While unloading the tandem I noticed the rear wheel wasn't seated in the chain stays and the rear wheel wouldn't rotate.  Then I saw the problem, the rear wheel was severely bent... in cycling terms, it was "taco'ed".  Somehow the tandem wheel was damaged when she hit the trash can.

Beth felt awful!  The big problem is that tandem bike wheels are pretty unique and you just don't walk into a bike shop and buy one, especially ours since it is a road tandem wheel (700mm) with a disk brake.  Being Friday afternoon we had to move quickly. I got on the phone and called DaVinci Designs in Denver where we bought the tandem several years ago.  Brian and Todd were great.  They had a wheel in stock, found a UPS Store in Boise, ID that they could ship it to for Monday delivery.  (I checked this afternoon and the wheel is already in Boise and we can pick it up while we are there to visit the state capital on our rest day.)

With the wheel issue resolved, or at least we had done all we could do, Beth got on her single bike to finish the ride.  This is only the second time on one of our bike trips where Beth has not ridden the tandem.  She commutes to work on a frequent basis, but riding on the open road in the mountains is quite a bit different.  Anyway she hopped on and we headed out to finish the 48 miles and 2500' of climbing left for the day. 

Then to add “insult to injury” (or maybe that should be the other way around), Beth crashed on her bike trying to get started up a steep section of the road.  She banged up her wrist, bruised her thumb, and hip.  She got up and dusted herself off and got back on her bike after we straightened the left shifter that had been knocked askew in the fall.

As she crested Ochoco Pass at 4700', it was a nice accomplishment to make up for the rough start and the crash.  Then we cruised on into Mitchell down a 12 mile, 2500' decent to find the park and set up camp.... RV style.  We cooked out in the park and had a nice dinner. Here is the track from Friday.

From my point of view it was a fantastic day.  The weather was great.  The views were fantastic and I just thoroughly enjoyed the ride.  The tandem wheel will be replaced and I wasn't going to let that spoil an otherwise great day.  I am proud of Beth for putting the accidents behind her and going on to have a good ride and a nice accomplishment.

Our riding today was much more normal.  We rode the 82 miles from Mitchell to Park City, OR without incident.  It was another great day.  We really enjoyed riding through the winding canyon in John Day Fossil Beds National Monument.  Beth rode 31 miles on her single and then Nicolas rode 45 miles with me from lunch to the Depot RV park in Prairie City. Here was the track from today.

We are still on schedule with four days of riding complete for a total of 350 miles and 15700' of climbing done.  Tomorrow we ride 68 miles and 5000' of climbing to Baker City, OR... while it is a shorter day, there are 3 tough climbs back-to-back. Looking forward to our 1st rest day after tomorrow. here is the route.