Day 64 Bend, OR to Eugene, OR

Since we had a long ride today (almost 120 miles), we decided it would be prudent to leave super early at sunrise.  By which I mean, we decided we'd leave at 7AM, and the last team ended up leaving at 8:40AM.  For some reason whenever we have homestays, we can never seem to get ourselves out in time.  But that's okay, since we had so little time to get to know our hosts, and even just an extra half hour or hour helped.  Plus, looking at the elevation profile today, most of us felt confident that it would not be too tough of a day.

Elevation profile for today.  In case you can't figure it out, the mantra for today's ride is "get to mile 38/39" and then it will be downhill from there...

After some fun food van packing (including sprinklers going off and getting our backpacks pretty wet), my riding group took off to a great start... and got lost within five minutes.   Fortunately we caught our mistake just a mile or so into it, and routed back to the original directions.  The first twenty miles or so flew by without a problem.  After the first water stop, we entered the Williamette National Forest.  We were greeted by a welcome sign that says, "Bikes may use full lane."  Usually we're limited to riding doubles on the very right side of the road, so to see signs that allowed us to take the full lane and force cars to pass in the other plane is wonderful.  I wanted to take a picture, but unfortunately that sign only showed up once and I never saw it again argh... but here's a similar, if not quite as good, sign:

That's right, do as the sign says

I don't think I've ever seen a forest quite like Williamette.  As we climbed (which was again, long but but gradual), it was still desert like a bit (just with a lot more trees... yes somehow apparently Oregon has managed to combine trees + desert)  For an example, actually look at picture above... trees, but not as many and still a lot of sage bushes.

However, right after you reach the summit and start the climb down, the entire other side of the mountain is much more moist and the trees are taller and there is far more vegetation (but not much in the way of sagebrush).  

Obligatory mountain summit picture

More lava rocks with a mountain on the left side in the background (too cloudy / bad camera... look very very hard and you'll be able to see it)

Yes, this incredibly green forest is actually the same mountain as the lava rock filled one above

 The picture above was taken right after our lunch on the other side of the mountain.  We actually had a really nice surprise for us, as Emily Lake's aunt Becky surprised her (just as Brady was surprised by his family yesterday) with a bunch of great food (smoked salmon and bagels... fanciest lunch in a long time).  And actually right afterwards, Ashley's dad also surprised her by just walking up in the woods with ice cream... a great moment for all of us.

Speaking of the other side of the mountain, the descent was one of the best yet.  I wish I could say that I had a ton of pictures (I often take pictures with my iPhone on the bike... I promise it's mostly safe), but today it just wasn't going to happen.  Even though the descent wasn't all that steep necessarily, it had more switchbacks I think than I have ever seen in my life.  Just winding turn after turn through the forest, with cars being told to drive at 25, 20, and even 15 mph, meaning that had there been cars descending, we definitely would have passed them easily.  It was a bit scary to wind down the mountain (especially if a car popped up going the opposite direction out of nowhere), but aside from the  forest being absolutely amazing, it was thrilling to drop 4000 feet in elevation in just over ten miles.

We had a slightly unpleasant experience once we arrived at the bottom of the mountain.  Even though cars in Oregon have almost all been very nice to us (with the exception of motorcyclists for some reason), with cars in the forest today slowing down a lot, going into the other lane, giving us friendly honks and waves.  At the bottom of the mountain, a driver who had been forced to wait a long time to pass us (again, because of the crazy switchbacks) yelled at us and told us to get off the road.  It's too bad that sometimes one angry driver can undo the good that twenty other friendly drivers do, but we try to stay optimistic and remember that Oregon is one of the most bike friendly states in the country.

The rest of today is somewhat of a blur, because in order to finish early enough, we really went fast, faster than I've been on the trip in a long time.  Unfortunately the road we were on wasn't so great (a  lot of traffic + small or no shoulder = no good), but thankfully most of the cars were very nice (including a lot of waving).  We entered Eugene around 7PM and we can't wait for our rest day tomorrow.

We're being hosted by the Our Saviour's Lutheran Church here in Eugene.  Can't believe I'm saying this, but they gave us a delicious Thanksgiving meal, with many of the usual sides.  It's definitely unexpected but great to have a taste of November in August.

Total mileage for today... ok so it was actually 118.4 or so, but I rode around in the parking lot to make it an even 120 miles.  Longest day since the day to Landers, WY (I think that day was also 120 miles).