Northwest

Back on the 26th we headed off to the airport for an early afternoon flight to the Pacific Northwest, aka Washington. 

I had packed up the old Orbea in my brand-new Airport Ninja bag the day before. This particular travel bag requires removal of the fork and saddle, and of course front brake and rear derailleur, but it makes for a small enough package that you can carry it on your back like a backpack and it doesn't get treated as over-sized. I had added the usual pipe insulation to the main tubes and seatstays, but that was mainly to minimize scratches because the bag itself has more than enough built-in padding. We'd already dropped off the dog at the vet for a long and expensive boarding stay, and were planning on parking in the airport long-term lot (also expensive) for the 10-day vacation that would be the first real vacation we'd taken in about three years. So naturally when we arrived we found the long-term garage to be full. Fortunately there is a new US Park place right down the street, so we parked there, which was marginally cheaper, and were immediately picked up by their shuttle for the short hop over to the airport.

We had arrived at the airport so far ahead of our flight time that the tiny Alaska Airlines counter was still shut down, so we had to wait a while for them to open it up. At MSY, Alaska is way down at the very end of the ticket counters and their electronic kiosks (which were no working at the time) are likewise in an odd little spot as if they were an afterthought. In contrast, at SeaTac there's about a quarter mile of Alaska Airlines counters. Anyway, I had paid the $20 for the checked bag (my bike) and then the agent offered to check one more bag for free, so that was nice. The flight was long but routine except that Candy got the full TSA pat-down thanks to her hip replacement hardware. Danielle met us at the airport for the drive from Seattle to Olympia which as usual featured a fair amount of bumper-to-bumper traffic. 

With the morning temperatures in the 50s, I didn't rush putting the bike back together the next day and finally headed out for a ride around 10:00 when the temperature was around 60°. I had loaded a number of routes onto my Garmin, and decided to start out with a 40-mile one that I had more-or-less done a few years before, heading south largely on the Chehalis Western Trail (a rails-to-trails bike path) and then through Tenino and back up through Olympia. I was in vacation mode, of course, and looking more at the map than my speed, which was the case for most of my rides up there.

The next day, the 28th, I ended up doing a somewhat longer ride, first north, then south, adding an extra loop on Military road after I got a text saying the others had gone to the grocery. I pulled up to the house just as they were unloading groceries, so it was perfect timing. I did a shorter ride on Monday the 29th because we were planning to do some paddle-boarding later in the day. The paddle-boarding adventure was harder than you'd think, but not because of the actual paddle-boarding part. The tide was out and parking was a fair distance from the water, so there was a rather long portage before we could actually get the boards in the water. We were on our way back when I pulled my paddle out of the water only to find that the paddle part had slipped out of the handle part. It immediately sank, of course, and so I ended up getting towed back in. I guess that at some point I may have grabbed the paddle right where the little spring-loaded button is that allows you to separate the sections and maybe twisted it or otherwise moved the button out place. Fortunately we were almost back by then. Tuesday's ride was basically a repeat of the southern loop, but in the afternoon we all went for a ride on the Trail to pick blackberries. I was amazed that there were tons of blackberries at the end of August! Here in La the blackberries are usually long gone by the end of July.

On Wednesday I did a fun ride mostly not on the Trail and over to the west, closer to Capitol State Forest. The route I mostly used was named something like "Wednesday Team Ride." The route had a lot more terrain than the southern loop, so that was nice. I got slightly turned around early in the ride when my Garmin told me I was off course when I wasn't but I eventually got that figured out. Then, toward the end of the ride I made a detour to meet the others for lunch in town, which was great, after which I rode back to the house. Most of the roads around Olympia have bike lanes (and roundabouts - love 'em or hate 'em), which is always nice when you are in unfamiliar territory. The next day was a long drive down to the Portland Zoo, which was OK but not particularly impressive. 

On Friday and Saturday I did rides in the morning and long walks/hikes in the afternoon. Saturday's 6.6 mile hike was mostly on the Mima Falls trail in the Capitol State Forest, and since I hadn't brought shoes for that I ended up buying a pair of hiking shoes at the local REI. I was glad I had, too, because there sure are a lot of rocks on Washington trails! It was a nice easy hike through the forest with occasional horseback riders and mountain bikers.

So on Sunday we headed back to SeaTac for the trip home which was slightly complicated by the fact that the daughter's Volvo tailgate that she had just gotten repaired to the tune of about a thousand dollars stopped working again. Luckily the Airport Ninja was small enough to easily go in though the side door! When we walked into the airport it looked like the day before Christmas or something because the place was packed. It took us about an hour to get through the security line that snaked all through the place. The flight home was crowded but otherwise fine, at least until we got close to Louisiana where the pilot had to navigate around some pretty spectacular storm clouds. During the flights out and back I read Mark Cavendish's book "Tour de Force" which was an interesting look into his remarkable and unpredictable 2021 season, along with a stage-by-stage account of the Tour de France. Cavendish can perhaps rub some people the wrong way, but I have always kind of identified with him as someone who just doesn't seem to have the right physiology for those long heroic climbs, while somehow always being able to put in a good sprint effort at the end - if I can just make it to the 200-meter flag without having to put my nose into the wind too much!

All in all it was a great trip and I was happy to have ignored a lot of email and fit in a bit over 290 miles on the bike, which more than justified the hassle of bringing it along. Even so, it I were to add up all of the various expenses that went into those ten days I'd probably have an anxiety attack.

This week it was back to the regular routine, thankfully not until Tuesday since Monday was Labor Day. Of course, Monday was also a Holiday Giro Ride, so despite getting to bed a little late I was able to make it to Starbucks where I found Brandon B, aka "Half-Carat" who is in the midst of some chemotherapy and for whom a number of the local riders had recently shaved their heads in support.