Day 52 – The Northwest Tradition Pours All Day

The pitter-patter of raindrops plunking on our house on wheels gave us warning that our two wheeled house on wheels were going to be wet all day. We hooked up the trailer in the rain just to get us used to being wet and were off. We had a wonderful soggy ride into Troutdale, OR since it was downhill for almost 10 miles and ate breakfast at Shari’s Restaurant. We were wet and upon entering the restaurant we got very cold so hot chocolate was in order and a nice warm breakfast got us ready for the road. We headed along the river and came upon this neighborhood.

I was not sure that I would like to live. No grass, no loud cars next door, and no property taxes. What more could a person want. Actually Uncle Sam undoubtedly got his cut from those people too just in some other creative way.
The city of Portland, OR was teeming with people going to work and riding their bikes (the rain doesn’t deter them around here since they get raid so often).

As we came down Ainsworth Street we came to this rose park.

It was meticulously maintained and Dad was in his hay day. Farther down the street there was this house that looked like the flower deliver truck tipped over and all the flowers went in the ground.

I didn’t see a lawn to mow through all of the flowers. We crossed to the other side of the river on the St. John Bridge and took US30 through many cities. We enjoyed the up and down of the roadway (mainly the down) and the miles seemed to go by very quickly. We came to Scapoose, OR and took one more opportunity to get some hot chocolate at the gas station. I was not too cold but hot chocolate on a rainy day just sounds so good.
The shoulders on the roads were very nice and the surface was very smooth. We entered the final city that we would be in OR, Ranier, and now would turn north for a few a day and then due west to the coast!!!! We still had this major obstacle called the Columbia River in our way. There was a bridge so we didn’t have to swim but from other cyclists experience on the bridge it is probably much safer to swim. With all of the logging done in the area, as the trucks cross the bridge in the wind, much bark flies off and accumulates in the shoulder creating no room for anyone to really even walk let along bike. The other issue was the visibility. On this rainy of a day people would be hard pressed to see us and they they would have to decide whether or not to avoid us. I didn’t want to put people in the place where they would have to make that decision. What to do!?!
Dad and I stood there discussing it and decided that we were not going to ride. The risk was not worth the reward so we were going to head across the street to the gas station and try to hitch a ride with some willing person in a pick-up truck. As I was getting on my bike to ride across a Les Schwab service truck pulled up to the light and I flagged him down and asked him if he was going across the bridge, which he was, and he told us he would love to give us a ride. The bed of his truck had only a few tires in it and it was perfect to hold our bikes in place as we went across.

Ron was a very nice guy and told us that we were smart (the first time I was have been accused of that on this trip) for getting a ride with someone because the bridge was truly a nightmare for bikes. He gave us perfect and simple directions to our campground as we unloaded our bikes from his truck and he sent us on our way.
We crossed the Allen Street Bridge and soon arrived at the campground. The girls were at McDonalds so we waited for them to arrive, we ate lunch and we went to Mt. St. Helens. We saw the video about what happened, which was very interesting but then the screen went up, the curtain was pulled away and the huge windows revealed a fluffy blanket of clouds where a mountain once stood. IT WAS GONE!!! Not really the clouds were just hiding it. Kind of anticlimactic. This is why we have no pictures of the mountain or any of the surrounding area. We couldn’t see anything! Sorry about that.
We went to bed hoping that the LORD would hold off the rain tomorrow. Being wet is not the end of the world but it makes the day a little more pleasant!