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Astoria to Manzanita1672
Day 11: 48.5 miles (515.3 tot), 2877 feet climbing (23761 tot) 2025-09-17

 

 

Beautiful ride down the Oregon Coast. We had several wonderful stops, including the Seaside Coffee Roasters, beaches, and beaches. We started the day w/ breakfast in the parking lot of the Atomic Hotel, went over a kind of nasty long, but low, bridge. It was nasty because of the traffic. The first half of this rather short route was beaches. The second half was all climbing, w/ spectacular views down on the beaches.

One of the issues w/ this route is a short, uphill tunnel where riders have to take up the lane and trust RVs to see the flashing yellow lights and your flashing 350-lumen rear blinkies. We had a couple riders who didn't trust the RVs and hugged the side of the road, which allowed the cars to just rip past in the tunnel. This was a mistake.

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Rest Day!1671
Day 10: 2025-09-16

 

 

Not going to ride today. Only have 9000 steps and haven't quite made my 1000-active-calorie goal, but I'm good. Astoria isn't really a destination place, but parts are cute and it has been a good day.

After a breakfast in the parking lot (there was a gazebo), we separated. I walked to the laundromat, and then a bike shop to get some new tubes. Afterwards I caught up on a few work things, did this blob, and then Jim, his wife (Carol?), Anne, Pam, Bob and I piled into Carol's van and went to the Astoria Column, which has 164 steps up and sits on a 600-ft hill. Beautiful views, and the local gimmick is throwing balsa gliders off the top. Most of ours didn't go that far, but Bob's probably went half to three-quarters of a mile and ended up in the sound.

A few years ago Pam actually did the Astoria-Megler Bridge, which turns out to be the longest continuous truss bridge in North America.

Tonight we go for a fish feast.

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Into Astoria Oregon.....1670
Day 9: 36.1 miles (418.3 tot), 1801 feet climbing (18007 tot) 2025-09-15

 

 

Today I had to put out breakfast and lunch supplies for the crowd (as part of being cook for the previous night), then we road 5 miles to a ferry that took us across the Columbia River to Oregon. Sadly no sigh to mark the passage. Beautiful boat trip, though. We talked to a local that lives on one of the islands. He explained how the dredging works, and about the locks up the river that are necessary because of all the dams.

After that we had another 30 relatively hard but fun miles to get into Astoria, where we are staying in the Atomic Hotel: a very basic but clean hotel a mile from the center of Astoria. Nice location, it will be good to be off the bike for a day.

The highlight of this day, besides the ferry ride (love ferries), was the stop at Rogue Brewery. Rogue makes great beer but is mostly unknown in most of the country. I had no idea it was here and just turned at the sign. This took me out on an old wooden pier where they had their "Public House", w/ all their beers on top. Six more folk showed up before we finally left.

Also, Pam started talking to a married couple nearby who were interested in our biking. Turns out they were interested because they had a good friend named Joe who did tours. Turns out Joe is/was an ACA tour leader that led one of the rides Pam has done.

Freakish.

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Into Cathlamut Marina...1669
Day 8: 61.0 miles (382.2 tot), 1962 feet climbing (16206 tot) 2025-09-14

 

 

Pronounced as in "Catlhamut I am tired!!!" Most of the day was fun, I rode w/ at least half the crowd during the day, biking down the Columbia river to the coast. It got even prettier as we got closer, but the shoulder completely disappeared.

Others were concerned, but not! I've done a lot of sketchy rides! It got tough in the last 10-15 miles to the coast, when we ran into a fierce headwind just as the nasty little hills disappeared. I was riding by myself by this time, and getting a bit tired. Then Zoey, our 22yo wunderkind rips past me cheerily calling hello. I was getting tired, so the idea of drafting someone else was appealing. I tentatively upped my pace to see if I could hold on, though she was already a couple hundred feet ahead. I could! So I used the last of my energy to reel her in and we zipped along chatting happily for five minutes until, w/ an enormous "pfft!", my rear tire went flat.

Luckily I was able to stop in one of the infrequent parking sections and so was shielded from the incessant traffic. I had everything I needed to get going again (multiple pumps, multiple patch kits, and one extra tube), so I waved her on and starting changing the tire. It was a rear wheel, which can be a pain, but was actually much easier on my bike because of the geometry of the dropouts (which hold the axel), and having a clean carbon-fiber belt rather than a greasy chain and rear derailleur. So all was good, except that......

(1) it wasn't a simple pinch or puncture flat, so I couldn't patch it and be on my way, and (2) during the rain the previous night I'd taken my frame bag into the tent, and during reorganization my extra tube fell out....

So I was screwed. There were 7-8 people behind me, but most people were touring on skinny road tires and tubes, like 28mm. It's possible that that would work in my 44mm tire for a brief time, the the volumetric difference is huge. Luckily, after 15 minutes or so Jeff Z came along w/ a 38mm tube and I installed that and made it to camp w/o issue.

Once there it was my turn to cook, w/ Dmitri, the second of our tour leaders. Dimitri is a good guy, but had no interest in participating in the decision process. It was non-ideal, but we eventually made a good meal of chili, greek salad, and a stab at cornbread (tasted great, but was all crumbles). The next morning Dimitri made delicious bacon and eggs for breakfast and all was fine.

We stayed in a Marina, which was not great, but being near the water is always fun...unless you are Stephon, who let the wind take his tent for the second time on this tour. This time it went into the foul marina water and started heading out to see. Luckily, Tim ran down the next doc barefoot and was able to fish it out before it totally set sail.

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Into Lewis and Clark State Park...1668
Day 7: 58.7 miles (321.2 tot), 1522 feet climbing (14244 tot) 2025-09-13

 

 

Nice without too many hills, though those that we had were pretty great (see above). This was a beautiful ride through pine forests and into a lovely state park. The highlight was that two riders from one of Brielle's previous tours, Paul and Rhee, drove down from Seattle w/ dinner, dessert, and puppy Rottweiler love for the whole crowd. The food was incredibly good (lasagna and salad), hearty, and appreciated. Zuzu was a very good dog, and quite affectionate.

I think it's a testament to these guys (Dough, Molly, Stephon, and Jim, plus Brielle), that Paul and Rhee insisted on coming out w/ food. Spending three months with a small number of others means you get to know them quite quickly, and pretty thoroughly. Despite that, they wanted to come!

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Into an RV park in Elma ...1667
Day 6: 57.2 miles (262.5 tot), 2198 feet climbing (12722 tot) 2025-09-12

 

 

An interesting day, w/ some crazy steep hills, but overall not too sharp or too long. We're spending the night in an RV park, but one w/ plenty of space, shade, laundry, and fabulous grass. Because of my knee replacement last November, these last two days are the longest I've done this year.

It was fun, though. I started riding with/ Doug (owned a company decimated by tariffs and newly retired) and Molly (worked for Bike Friday for a few years), two folk who met on an earlier ride and got so close that their families know each other. Both are exceedingly strong riders. We were soon joined by Jim, recently retired from a company that builds facilities for high-tech needs, recently work in San Francisco for a relatively large amount of time.

I had a blast w/ those three until we hit the 17% hill (!!!), after which I biked mostly with Pam (not fast but incredibly strong, recently rode the Tour D'Afrique from Cairo to Cape Town (6000 miles, 4 months, in Africa), Tim, a laconic dude from Louisiana, and Jeff G, a recently retired high mucky-muck from ATT and who lives in Ohio and Florida. We also spent some time with Anne, who works in senior living and serves on boards for community banks.

On this trip there are a ton of connections between various riders (and our leader Brielle):

• Jeff G/Tim/Bob all rode the Southern Tier in 2023.
• Brielle was the leader of the 2024 TransAm that included Stephon, Jim, Molly, and Doug.
• "Mark" (not on this tour) was a co-leader of both the above.
• Brielle and Pam were both riders on the Sierra Sampler in 2016, when their leader was Kelly Hannigan.
• Kelly Hannigan was leader when I did the Southern Tier in 2018
• Anne and Brielle both know a Steve Powell.
• Pam's oldest friend's sister is a good friend of Stephon (though they didn't know each other)
• I've been talking longingly about doing this crazy trip doing basically the length of Africa, and Pam turns out to have done this last year.

Being part of a community of bike tourers is fun.

Surrounding the picnic table are Tim, Stephon, Jeff from Ohio, Anne, Jim, Pam, and me.

The picture w/ the three are Jeff G, Jeff Z, and me. Jeff G is telling us about the dildo he supposedly saw on the side of the road.

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Long Day into Belfair State Park1666
Day 5: 71.9 miles (205.3 tot), 4298 feet climbing (10524 tot) 2025-09-11

 

 

This was a long, not very exciting day w/ a few highlights. First highlight was the Larry Scott memorial trail. Wonderful forest path. Not long after there was the Hood Canal Bridge, "the longest floating bridge in the world located in a saltwater tidal basin", and third longest overall. I'm not sure exactly how all this works, but the vast majority of the weight is supported by pontoons. The rationale behind the design is that the water was too deep: from 80 to 340 feet, w/ tidal swings of 16 feet. So the surface of the bridge actually rises and falls by that amount.

Then there was a lot of "eh?", and finally we arrived at Belfair State Park, which was fabulous. We were right on the beach, w/ front row seats for the bike-boarders (some of whom would actually get way up off the water via hydrofoils). At some point I'll have video, but you've probably seen this if you vacation in the south. I had not seen this at all.

The other noteworthy event was a nest of raccoons peeing and pooping on Bob's tent. This was bizarre and just a bit unwelcome.

Finally, this was 71 miles! Prior to this tour I did get in ~2400 miles of training, but only 1 day over 50 miles and 3 over 40. The reason is that my right knee was replaced in November. I haven't been willing to push it too far until now. But now time it up! Bottom line: doing fine....

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Into Port Townsend1665
Day 4: 37.7 miles (133.4 tot), 1903 feet climbing (6226 tot) 2025-09-10

 

 

...and right out the other side. Today was short because we had a sometimes unpredictable ferry from Whidbey Island to Port Townsend. In fact this morning was a beautiful fog-shrouded ride that threatened to leave us stranded at a coffee shop for hours because the first few ferries were expected to be canceled. In the end, none of them were and we all caught the half-hour ferry ride at 11:45 over to the Olympic Peninsula. By then, and especially after the sprint for the ferry that we missed at 10:15, we all just headed to our sites on the beach. Part of the reason is that the local navy base was flying F-18 Hornets in pairs to practice short carrier landings last night. So until 10:30 or fighters were flying low over our heads with flaps and undercarriage down, and then they'd hit the afterburner. Grrr.

The way these tours work is that we have 12 riders and 2 leaders. The leaders alternate days riding "sweep" (following the last rider to ensure everyone is safe) and driving the van, which is pulling the trailer that has all our kitchen and other sundry supplies.

We have a rotating pair of cooks for each day. Ideally, the cooks and the van driver leave the campground at 3pm to go shopping for the dinner, and for breakfast and lunch supplies. In this crowd, the leaders have included themselves in the rota, though this is a bit unusual, and very welcome. W/ a total of 14 people, this means everyone is cook for one day per week, six total in this trip. Hardly honorous, though a bit stressful for those who don't often cook (me). Appetisers (usually chips and veggies) are put out at 5, dinner served at 6, and map meeting (where we discuss the coming day's ride) is at 7. Obviously this sometimes needs to be adjusted for longer or more difficult days (71 miles and 4030 ft of climbing tomorrow), but since we aren't carrying our own gear we can usually get to the site quickly when necessary. And the site is almost always a campground. On the west coast, and especially in NoCal, this usually means beautiful sites, ocean views, maybe a redwood or 100.

Down south it's a bit trickier and RV parks sometimes are necessary. This isn't as bad as it sounds, as an RV park usually has washers and dryers, and good kitchen facilities.

What the van has in camping sites is not bad, however. We have a standalone 3-burner propane stove, several big pots, and assorted cutlery.

Tonight is not a "blood moon", which is the red moon you see during a total lunar eclipse. The red comes from mostly red light skimming through the atmosphere to bounce off the moon (blue light is mostly scattered). That was yesterday. However, there was still a partial eclipse tonight and it is still very red. Thanks for pointing it out Dimitri!

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Deception Pass1664
Day 3: 42.1 miles (95.7 tot), 1896 feet climbing (4323 tot) 2025-09-09

 

 

Another short day took us out of Bellingham and down to the evocatively named Deception Pass, and the similarly named state park and bridge. The "deception" is that the original white discoverers initially thought Whidbey Island was a peninsula.

The day included a few more miles of great bike trails, some great downhills, and the Deception Bridge in two of the following pictures. Beautiful bridge w/ heavy car traffic and a tiny raised walkway on the side. A couple of us opted to take up the whole lane, which took the tension out of it for me. I worry more about walking/biking along 300-ft drops than a car or 10 :-) I was vindicated when one of the Jeffs was finishing the walk across the bridge on the narrow pathway, saw me waiting, bumped a protrusion from the railing and teetereed awkwardly against the railing. Jeff is 6'4"; the railing looked very low. But all was good!

During dinner I had a fascinating conversation with Pam about her 6000-mile tour in Africa last year, and then we trooped down to the beach to watch the sunset. We ended the day watching a seal chase a big fish right at a guy fishing on the beach. He drops his pole and flips it onto the beach by smacking at the water as the seal tries to grab it away from him.

Pretty good, and a bit bizarre, day.

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Touch the border!1663
Day 2: 40.4 miles (53.6 tot), 1220 feet climbing (2427 tot) 2025-09-08

 

 

This trip is border-to-border, so we started by loading 14 bikes on the top of the van, piling in, and driving to the border. Arriving there we unloaded and headed to the Peace Arch, which officially commemorates the Treaty of Ghent that ended the war of 1812 between the US and England (including Canada). Unofficially, it commemorates "over 200 years of peaceful coexistence and friendship between the two nations".

Inscriptions include:"Children of a Common Mother" on the U.S. side, "Brethren Dwelling Together in Unity√ on the Canadian side, and "May These Gates Never Be Closed" above the archway. Whelp, it was good while it lasted. The brief glow of good feeling flickered a bit reading those words.

But we were starting our adventure, so off we went. We only had 40 miles, so there was no great urgency, but people naturally separated into different groups. By far the fastest rider is 22yo Zoey (on the left of one of the pictures, the other being our leader Brielle), who is ranked 20th in the under-23 cross-country mountain biking rankings for the US. There are several other extremely fast cyclists, and then the rest of us. I'm merely trying to survive after messing up my newly-reconstructed right knee in the runup to the tour. If I can get through the first week or two, I'm good.

The group is overall a very impressive bunch of people, and I'm looking forward to getting to know them all over the next six weeks.

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The Group comes together1662
Day 1: 13.2 miles (13.2 tot), 669 feet climbing (1207 tot) 2025-09-07

 

 

We have 12 riders and two leaders. The other leaders alternate driving the van; everyone else bikes.

I'm thinking that the world of road-based touring is getting smaller by the day, at least here in the US. Of the 13 riders, I think only four (including me) have arrived not knowing any of the others. Even our leader, Brielle, knew at least three or four already. Much of this is by design, of course, they call up their buds and say let's go do a trip together. But it's actually more than than. One guy did a TDA (another tour group) ntrip in Korea and Japan with Stephane, a French guy that I briefly rode with on the Transam in 2023. Three of us were independently signed up for a TDA trip in Africa called cape to kill for fall 2026, before it was cancelled. Rosana biked with a woman in the Baltics this year who was also signed up for that same trip. None of the four of us knew each other! It get's worse: Stephane signed up to do this crazy TDA trip from Tuktoyaktuk to Panama City. The woman Rosana met in Estonia and Pam, one of the women on this pacific coast trip, have both signed up to the last part of Stephane's trip: Mexico City down to Panama City.

I'll have pictures of all these folk tomorrow. For now you get to see another group of ACA riders heading down the coast two days ahead of us, a drab day over the water, pretty winding road, and an overworked goat.

Tomorrow will be a short ride: 40 miles from the Canadian border back to our campsite here at Larrabee State Park outside Bellingham. After that it will be on in earnest...

(pics might need to wait until more bandwidth tomorrow)

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Heading west!1661
Day 0: 2025-09-06

 

 

At the campsite now w/ one other guy, Jeff from Florida. We meet up w/ the rest of the group tomorrow afternoon, and then Monday bus up to the Canadian border and bike back to Larrabee State Park.

The real tour, all 1800 miles of it, starts Tuesday.