Day 4: To the Ocean!

Day 4: Stubb Stewart Campground to Astoria

We woke up to another beautiful day, feeling ready to get to the coast. Our bike bags are packed full; mine is heavier than I’ve ever experienced as we ride the last ten miles of the rail trail.

Panniers vs Trailers: Good panniers are important. We like Ortlieb, which are the same material as dry bags but with hefty hardware to attach to your racks. The load you carry is similar to a long distance back packer 50 - 80 lbs.. More and more people are using trailers that attach to the rear axle. This is an easy way to convert a standard road bike to a long-haul touring bike. We almost went with a trailer, but for a couple of reasons decided to go with old-school touring bikes and panniers. One factor is that the torque of the heavy load might be rough on our carbon bikes and second, hauling a trailer prevents drafting, something I do a lot of behind Todd to save energy.

Traditional touring bikes have brazeons for attaching the racks, longer wheel base and heavier duty cranks and breaks. Steel helps with the road shock on the body, allowing for more comfortable miles. A really great saddle is probably more important than anything. The problem is-- what one person loves might cause another person endless misery, so try to find shops that will allow you to demo saddles and then demo for at least a 60 mile ride. All saddles feel pretty great for 30-40 miles.

Back to the trip...

We got to the end of the rail trail in Vernonia and heard the rumbling of trucks and then saw the huge logging trucks barrelling along route 47... the road we were supposed to be on for a good number of miles! With hesitation we got on the road. To our delight the truckers were very polite and safe, giving us plenty of room and warning. We waved as they passed and they flashed their lights in response.

The road from Vernonia to Astoria appears to travel through the wilderness, but as we ride, we come across a peppering of houses, vacant churches and small businesses. It seems right for our first significant day of riding not to be thrown completely into the wilds. We pass  Federal Roosevelt Elk viewing area just to find people haying the fields where the elk usually roam. We pass long stretches of quiet winding roads and small towns. We have lunch at a defunct church: hummus, cheese on bread. Yum.

We finally come across a proper store -- the Big “O” Saloon --- and waddle in to indulge ourselves. Todd chooses local beef jerky and I choose Kettle House Dijon Chips. We share a “throwback” Pepsi (contains real sugar!)

The interior of the saloon shows the suspenders of different logging companies.

Food on a bike tour: The body does some amazing things when you ride lots of miles every day, hauling lots of gear. The most amazing thing to me is that it just keeps going. We can ride ten days or more in a row and not feel too tired. But this depends a lot on getting a lot of fuel in the tank. I can eat many foods on a trip that I can’t eat at home without feeling yucky. A few slugs of a cold Coca-Cola can be the best thing in the world at mile 80, but at home the sweetness is too much. It is important to have solid go-to foods on board and handy at all times. I eat Larabars, gorp and keep a few Hammer Gels on hand for when the going gets really tough. End of day eating has to be substantial to give the muscles what they need to rebuild while you sleep. Central to this is Protein. One of our favorites is tuna-rice-quinoa-pea-cheese casserole. It is super easy to make with quick rice and quinoa. I also carry a few avocados and hummus for lunch to give us a break from peanut butter and jelly. An equally favorite dinner food are the Indian Tasty-bite dinners that are vacuum packed, inexpensive and super tasty. We eat them with tons of rice and cheese. For breakie we eat Uncle Bob’s GF hot cereal with dried fruit and … you guessed it.. cheese. Special occasions call for eggs and cheese. Gluten Free diet often leaves me with only soft corn tortillas with which I make bean, egg, cheese wraps for breakie.

Back to the trip...

After the saloon stop we made our way down the Young River Valley and approached Astoria from the South---highly recommended. Astoria rises up out of the horizon -- a town that looks perched on a hill, surrounded by ocean. It is very lovely.

After crossing a bridge on the very narrow and high sidewalk we had to creep our way up very steep roads to get up and then over to the city itself, which looks like a typical ocean side town. We ate out for the first time, burgers and fish and chips and micro-brew beers. Anyone who is spoiled by Vermont beer will not be disappointed here.

Astoria is beautiful! It is a grand place to start the trip with the full blast of the Pacific coming in and fish and chips to be eaten.

After dinner we crept our way up the steep hill again (800 ft) and up even farther to the house of our second warm showers hosts-- Meredith and Jason. They are a young couple who love to host cyclists. They get about 4-5 calls or email requests a week since Astoria is the start of the Oregon Coast trail and a published transcontinental bike ride. They are currently the only hosts listed for Astoria. Despite expecting three other cyclists and three family members they welcomed us into their home cheerfully.

Here is the view from their garage of the famously-scary-to-bike-across bridge connecting Astoria to Washington State.

Jason is a Coast Guard helicopter pilot and had many good stories to tell and a quiver of bikes to rival ours! The view out of his garage was fantastic and so was sitting in the Lazy Boy!

This visit was one of the highlights of our trip. The other cyclists were from the Netherlands and had just finished a cross country trip. Margaret, Paul and Rick. They were about our age and very warm and open.

Jason made us carrot cake and fruit cobbler, made a fire outside and Meredith treated us to toasted sweet sandwiches over the open fire. In the morning they made all of us sweet potato ginger pancakes and good coffee while we chatted. At one point, as I was talking to his mom and hearing her describe life after the death of her husband, tears travelled down my face as I thought about how we were all strangers 24 hours ago.

Sandy, Jason and Meredith

Thank you Jason and Meredith!