I am back and decompressing from this year’s tour in the Pacific Northwest.
Here’s a summary of the ride:
7/7 Renton, WA to Yelm, WA - 62 Miles
7/8 Yelm to Castle Rock, WA - 67 Miles - Bonked - Mid-90’s - STP Route
7/9 Castle Rock to Portland, OR - 66 Miles - Mid 90’s
710 Portland to Ainsworth State Park, Columbia River Gorge - 46 Miles - 1/2 Day Ride
7/11 Ainsworth State Park to Hood River, OR - 32 Miles - 1/2 Day Replaced Rear Wheel
7/12 Hood River to Maryhill State Park, WA - 48 Miles - 1/2 Day Ride - Late Start - Mid 90’s
7/13 Maryhill State Park to Plymouth State Park - 83 Miles - Bonked - Upper 90’s
7/14 Plymouth to Walla Walla, WA - 60 Miles - Bonked - Upper 90’s
Temperature moved into 106 degree range for next 5 days. 7/19 temp was 104 at 10 PM. We moved into motels and watched the Tour De France and picked up a Van to carry bikes.
7/18 Coeur D’Alene Trail - 43 Miles
7/20 Centenial Trail, Spokane WA - 21 Miles
This was my first tour in the Northwest and I learned a lot about Western riding. I’ll fill in the details in following posts.
Pictures from the ride have been posted on Flickr.
Total Ride - 528 Miles
Filed under: Rides
Welcome back, Roland. We were driving through Oregon and Idaho during the heat wave when you were on the road. I thought about what it must have been like for you when the temperature hit 98 and even 106 in Boise! I interested to hear your impressions of the Slipstream on this ride.
Longfellow, thanks for the good words. It is nice to be home. I am snowed under with work right now but will give you lots of details as I add posts.
The Slipstream performed well. The only problem I had was broken spokes on the rear wheel but I don’t think that was a Longbikes problem. The axle of the rear wheel poked through the case during shipping to Renton, Washington. As soon as I looked at it I knew it was a problem but rationalized that it would be OK. Well on the second day 2 spokes broke on the drive side of the rear wheel. I patched them with Kevlar Repair Spokes but wound up replacing the wheel in Hood River (Day 5).
The heavier tires (1 1/2 versus 1.25) and self sealing tubes had a significant impact on performance but with 40 pounds of gear in the rear pannier the effect was washed out.
The biggest issues for me was the temperature and traffic. I am not really good once the temperature hits 90 and we were riding for hours with the temperature in the mid 90’s. The problem I had not really appreciated was the traffic and that we would be forced to ride on the Interstate and other roads with a lot of truck traffic.
I’ll go into more details later …. Roland