Days 6 and 7 - Quinault to Raymond to Ilwaco

Here is the itinerary for our Africa trip.

Quinault to Raymond

Good wines support local causes. Every bottle has a specific charity.

Since today would be about 100 miles, I made sure to leave early on the road by 6:30. For the first time, the fog lifted before noon and we were in the sun at about 7:30. The ride itself today was uneventful. I did have a couple of people follow me for a while thanking me for being a windbreak. It isn’t often that I get that opportunity as I tend to be significantly bigger than most of the other riders. We did follow the coastline more today and I saw more birds along one beach than I have seen on spring bird trips. I met some birdwatchers there, but they had not seen anything special, just enjoying the sun and birds.

Gulls, gulls, and more gulls

We did have about 15 miles of strong headwind as we rode from Aberdeen to Westport, but once we hit the ocean and turned south and east towards Tokeland and Raymond, the wind became to be a big supporter. I arrived in Raymond at 96 miles so I rode around town a bit and a little further down the coast to end at just over 100 miles – my first century.

One of about 20 Raymond sculptures

Raymond is doing pretty well for a small coastal town dependent on the sea and the forests. There is quite a bit downtown and the Pitchwood Alehouse with live music and good food.. Our camp is right next to their small live theater that does five productions a year – one being a children’s show. Their goal is to keep theater alive in Raymond and the volunteers I met certainly seem up to the challenge. The town is well-decorated with sculptures representing the various aspects of the city and they have built a nice bike trail that heads towards Ilwaco and Long Beach.

Mural from railroad days

 Raymond to Ilwaco

The last ride would be another short one of about 50 miles so I was in no hurry to get started. I took so much time I was one of the last to leave camp and therefore one of the last to arrive in Ilwaco. The fog lifted almost immediately providing some lovely views over the water. We followed the new bicycle trail to South Bend. South Bend is the county seat of Pacific County by virtue of the fact that they stole it from Oysterville on the Long Beach Peninsula. I tried to get more information, but the online sites ignore this interesting bit of history. The first 20 miles were almost perfectly flat followed by another 20 miles of rollers, most of which only slowed us down a bit. The whole length followed the coast of Willapa Bay providing some beautiful riding.

This fog lifted quickly after providing a nice morning view

After navigating through town we arrived at Cape Disappointment State Park and more rollers before reaching Waikiki Beach and the end of the ride. Some of the riders did a ceremonial dip in the Ocean before loading up for the ride home. Lines became the order of the day as over 200 of the riders rode the buses back to Seattle. Bicycles are loaded in one truck and bags into another. Of course, the first part of getting a bag into the truck would be finding it amongst the 500 or so lying on the blacktop.

Find your bag

Stand in line

After lunch and goodbyes to new friends, Linda picked me up and we left for the Shelburne Inn where we would have dinner and spend the night. Reputed to be one of the best restaurants anywhere, we were somewhat disappointed, but we did have a nice drive around the Peninsula and a short walk through the wildlife refuge at the north end of the peninsula. Next year the ride will begin here and end in Walla Walla where I’m sure we will find some time for wine tasting.

 

 

RAW Days 4 and 5 - Port Angeles to Forks to Quinault

Here is our itinerary for the Africa trip.

Port Angeles to Forks

70 miles today along some rather dangerous roads we had to share with logging trucks, but a beautiful stretch of road. No Olympic Discovery Trail today although we did ride on the double decker bridge built for the trail. It’s just that we were on the Highway above the trail section. Hopefully, by the time they do this section again on RAW, the trail will be finished. Most of the first 30 miles was foggy this morning. The morning fog seems to be lasting the entire morning here. We did hit a clear spot on the above-mentioned bridge over the Elwah River. Several gave up their jackets thinking we were done with the fog. Most of them regretted that move as we quickly found the fog again.

Checking out the Discovery Trail below

Elwah River flowing free

Our first rest stop was in Joyce at the Blackberry Café. Enough riders stopped for something blackberry to eat to make the restaurant standing-room only. One of the riders did get into an interesting conversation with some loggers. She explained her fear of them driving so close to the riders. They were upset that we were even there interfering with their expectation to be able to drive as fast as they felt safe. No changing of minds, but at least some understanding. It does show the importance of a ride like this making the locals feel like the bicycles are making a positive impact and not just getting in the way. I heard later that the police were called about one driver who went out of his way to be dangerous. Hopefully, next time this ride comes through here, the Olympic Discovery Trail will be complete and this problem will be eliminated.
Lunch was at Pillar Point, one of the few places along 112 where we actually approach the Strait of Juan de Fuca. From there we rode 10 easy miles before starting our last big climb of the week over the coast range to Highway 101. I had hoped to take a short detour to visit Snider Ranger Station where we had lived when I was four, but we were already past that turnoff when we hit 101 so that will have to wait for another time.


Forks Timber Museum

We spent the night in Forks where we were entertained by the Quileute Ocean Canoe Dancers who had just returned by canoe from Bella Coola in British Columbia. I took an easy ride through town to see all the “Twilight” references. What I did not see was a tavern much to my surprise.

Forks to Quinault

Today we rode 65 miles on Highway 101. Washington’s coast road  does not spend much time actually on the coast. We were close to the ocean for only about five miles. We stopped for lunch at Beach 4 – yes, we use numbers to name the beaches here. The spectacular stop is at Kalaloch Lodge, a short rock cliff overlooking a creek and sandy beach. A small hotel and restaurant are joined by about 20 cabins. Linda and I often drive up here from Ocean Shores for a pleasant lunch watching the eagles and gulls cavorting on the beach and in the air.

Typical morning fog lasts until noon

Ruby Beach where it was still foggy

We camped at Quinault High School in Amanda Park. This time I chose to not visit my former home on Lake Quinault. Another 20 miles wasn’t necessary since we would be riding 100 miles the next day.

 

RAW Days 2 and 3 - Coupeville to Port Angeles

Here is the itinerary for our Africa trip.

Coupeville to Port Angeles

Near the ferry landing. The cabins are for rent.

Today we rode from Coupeville to Port Angeles. Because the ride included a ferry trip, we had a very early start. I got things as ready as I could so I could get my clothes bag on the truck at 4:45 am on the way to breakfast and then have time to strike the tent and be on the road by 6:00 for the flat four miles to the ferry landing. We awoke to a heavy fog which made me glad I had made the decision to bring everything other than my bike inside the tent. Everything was so damp, we could just as easily had a rainstorm overnight things we so wet.

 

Everyone made it to the ferry on time including Governor Inslee who joined us for the day. Inslee made an official declaration about the ride and named the director as the person of the day. No one knew he was coming until he called the night before to say he would take the place of an aide who was unable to ride for the day. An avid cyclist, Inslee was one of the early finishers for the day.

Discovery Bay

The highlight of the ride was the amount of time we got to ride on the Olympic Discovery Trail. This multi-use trail will eventually extend 126 miles from Port Townsend to the Pacific Ocean at LaPush. By skirting the north side of Lake Crescent it will avoid what is not a difficult choice between a narrow section of Highway 101 or a long ride on Highway 112 where riders must compete with logging trucks who are none too happy about sharing the road. For now we have about 40 miles available and can see what a great job they have done to create this trail. We traveled through heavily wooded sections and spent time right along the coast enjoying the views of the water. For today, the few miles we actually we enjoyed lightly traveled roads usually with wide shoulders. The only difficult part of the ride was the last few miles into Port Angeles as we faced a good headwind once we left the forest.

One of the beautiful Madrona trees seen along the coast from BC to California

The bark peels naturally leaving this great beauty

One unfinished section of the trail. Fortunately, only about 100 feet of gravel.

Today was a good bird day with a bald eagle in the trees above the ferry landing, marbled murrelets as we rode the ferry and a pair of kingfishers flashing in front of me along Discovery Bay. Of course, we also saw a number of gulls along the coast line. The S’Kallam tribe drum band played a welcome song and a blanket song for our evening entertainment as they passed the blanket raising money for a Hawaii trip to a PowWow in Hawaii honoring one of their elders. Several pre-school age children soloed during the performance.

S'Klallam Dancers

Following the performance, the tribal chair talked about effort to remove the two dams on the Elwah River. So far, this is the largest dam removal project in the US. They will finish the removal of the second dam this year opening the rivers to salmon for the first time in nearly 100 years. The Elwah was once famous for the 100 pound chinook salmon that were regularly caught. While about 1/3 of the sediment is yet to make its way down the river, they are already seeing salmon return to some of the tributaries and birds returning to the recreated sandbars at the mouth of the river.

Port Angeles Rest Day

Today is the rest day which means there are optional rides for those who want to further punish their bodies. Ride alternatives include the 12 mile climb up Hurricane Ridge and an easier 40-mile loop. Other options included taking the Black Ball Ferry to Victoria or just hanging out in Port Angeles. The local bicycle club arranged for us to get a free beer at one of the local breweries where it set up a bike corral to protect the bikes while we wandered around downtown.

Free beer and bicycle parking at the Barhop.

Port Angeles waterfront art

 I thought I would try the 40-mile loop but after about 12 miles, I decided I would just head back to town to find a bookstore and lunch before heading back to camp. Since I had already finished two of the three books I brought on the ride and was nearly done with the third, I knew I would need a couple more. Fortunately, PA has two nice bookstores downtown where I was able to find a couple of books already on my reading list. I had a great burger and beer at the Next Door Gastropub where I met a couple from Dallas, Texas who were on their way to Vancouver, Washington so I was able to give them some advice about things to do and see in my home town.

Camp

After a shower back at camp, I hopped on the bus to take a tour of the Arthur D. Feiro Marine Life Center. Fiero was a high school biology teacher who pretty much single-handedly brought the center to life and played a major role in the creation and development of Peninsula Community College.  The center is a research facility with several live tanks filled with local sea life. Our guide had been a metal engineer in Minnesota before deciding on a second career as a marine biologist. Somehow he made it to PA where he earned at AA degree and Peninsula Community College and now spends most of his time volunteering at the Marine Center. Among other things he told us about how the octopus injects a paralyzing element into its crab captives. The paralyzer softens the crab meat so that the octopus can suck it out of the crab without crushing the shell. After the tour, I headed over to the Bar Hop for my free beer before the bus ride back to camp and dinner.

Ride Around Washington - Day 1 - LaConner to Coupeville

Here is our itinerary for the Africa trip.

This year I decided to do the “Ride Around Washington” (RAW) bicycle trip instead of Cycle Oregon. The decision wasn’t really difficult since Cycle Oregon ends on September 14 and we leave for South Africa on the 16^th. That timing is just a bit close for travel plans. Moreover, this year RAW begins a special four-year cycle that really will circumnavigate the state. This year we will ride from La Conner to Ilwaco. Over the next three years, the ride will continue on to Walla Walla, somewhere north of Spokane, and then across Highway 20 and back to La Conner in 2017. I expect to be among those who completes the full circuit.

This must be the place to start

After a great couple of days with my sister Kristie and her husband Roy in Bellingham that included a day of unsuccessful salmon fishing on Puget Sound, Kristie and Linda took me to the starting point in La Conner. We stopped at a small bakery so I could get a couple of breakfast sandwiches which turned out to be completely made to order. I was surprised they didn’t bake the bread special given the multitude of choices I had for bread, cheese, meats and condiments. They were an excellent way to start the day.

Penn Cove - Home of some of the best mussels

After check-in, I changed into my bicycle clothes and took off for Coupeville along with the 250 other riders. Because of the later start on the first day, we would only travel 43 miles, but they included three of the biggest hills we would encounter on the ride. Two of them were about ¾ of a mile at at least a 10% grade. The third was just as steep but less than ¼ mile. Two riders whose electronic gear includes something that calculates grade said they had readings of 19% and 24% on part of those hills.  For comparison, the old Columbia Gorge highway seldom has a grade of over 6%. Several riders walked portions of each of these hills. I managed to stay on the bike for all of the hills, but I do have to admit that on the third one, I followed a walker and never gained an inch as we both sped up the hill.

Deception Pass

The scenery is incredible as we passed along several beaches including Penn Cove, home of the famous mussels and crossed over the Deception Pass Bridge and enjoyed the tidal action below. Boats must take care as they navigate the narrow passageway when the tide is tearing through. I got off my bike to walk over the bridge and take some photographs. That is when I discovered that in spite of all my careful planning I had left the bike bag in the car. Since it contained a spare tub and tools along with the camera and binoculars, I immediately tried to call Linda who was still having breakfast or shopping in La Conner. Unfortunately, my phone said, “No service,” a situation that did not change for another hour after a hurried lunch break. Of course, Linda did not answer the phone or respond to the text. Neither did Kristie, so I was left to hope they would catch it before they got back to Bellingham. They did catch the message just before turning away from the road to Coupeville and we finally met up about a mile before I got to camp. They took advantage of the opportunity to have a nice dinner in Coupeville before heading home while I set up my tent and waited in the dinner line for pot roast, mashed potatoes, carrots and salad with many, many cherry tomatoes.

The final rest stop of the day

After Cycle Oregon last summer with its 2200 riders, this ride seems tiny in comparison. Instead of six shower trucks, we only need one and meals are served from a single station which makes the lines a bit longer for food, but still bearable since there really isn’t much to do besides enjoy conversations about the day’s ride. We do have a meeting each evening to provide a bit of information about the next day’s ride and some entertainment from the local community. That usually lasts about 30 minutes so we have the rest of the evening free to entertain ourselves.

Grays Harbor Shorebird Festival

Great weather at Bottle Beach

 Over the weekend I attended the Grays Harbor Shorebird Festival for the fifth time. They offer tours, a keynote speaker and a few vendors. We bought our first pair of Vortex binoculars from the Backyard Bird Shop in Gig Harbor at the first festival we attended. We like them so well we bought a second pair and a scope from Vortex in following years. 

Immature Bald Eagle at Tokeland Harbor

This year I took tours to the Westport area and Quinault, and on Sunday took advantage of hands-on help from the keynote speaker, Clay Taylor, Swarovski’s digiscoping expert. No new birds this trip, but we did get some great views of many of the shorebirds and even a few others. The marginal weather this year dampened things a bit, especially on the Saturday trip to Quinault.

Sandpipers in the lee of the hummock as the tide comes in

No Peregrine, but something spooked the birds

Grays Harbor is one of the most important stops on the Pacific Flyway as millions of shorebirds fuel up on their way to their Arctic breeding grounds. On Friday, we took a yellow school bus to Westport and the nearby villages of Grayland and Tokeland. Fortunately, I did not have to share my seat. School buses are not really built for tall adults. The highlight of this tour is Bottle Beach, a few miles east of Westport. A nice new boardwalk leads to a blind overlooking the beach although the best way to view the birds is to get there about two hours before high tide, stake out a nice sandy spot on the gentle sloping beach and wait for the tide to push the birds to you. I have watched really well-prepared photographers let the water come up and around them to get what must be fabulous close-ups of the birds as rising tide forces them closer and closer. Even our larger group did not scare the birds as we managed to stay quite still and quiet. While the peregrines did not spook the birds on this trip, they can create a good deal of excitement and great pictures of shorebirds blasting off to avoid the danger.

Dunlin in breeding plumage

Dunlin not ready for prime time

Short-billed Dowitcher

Saturday, a much smaller group of ten rode in the Lake Quinault Lodge van with one of their guides and two other leaders to the Quinault Rain Forest. Unfortunately, the rain forest lived up to its name causing many of the birds to be quieter and more elusive.  Nevertheless, we were able to get some good views of a pair of dippers and Bunch Falls and some other fairly rare birds including an Evening Grosbeak and Purple Finch. We took a short walk along the lake shore leaving from the Lodge which took us right past the spot where I lived when I started elementary school. The condemned house we lived in has been replaced by a newer model retaining its great view of the lake and short walk to the water where I remember learning to float as Dad and I went down there nearly every evening in the summer while Mom cooked dinner for the four of us. I learned to swim the next summer in the pool at Concrete High School. As those of us who live in the Northwest know, summers are usually warm and sunny most of the time. The rain record at the lodge showed rainfall to be over 20” most of the winter months, but under 5” during the summer. The winter we lived there (1955-56) the rainfall was typical, but the timing must have been unusual because the lake rose about ten feet coming within a couple of feet of flooding our house. It did rise enough to creep into the garage.

Can you find the Dipper. These small gray birds love water like this where they wander the rocks in the rushing water to catch bugs and small fish being washed down stream. The nest is often hidden behind rocks or under logs in midstream.

Sunday, I spent a few hours with the digi-scoper, learning more about how to make use of the scope as an extra-long lens for photography. The last few pictures show how amazing the results can be. It took us an hour of exploration before we found a suitable site on the beach for the pictures. But finally, we did arrive at a spot where the sun was on the right side of the birds and we could get in some guided practice. Gulls, Marbled Godwits, and Western Sandpipers provided the subjects.

Western Gull

Immature Western Gull

Marbled Godwit and Semipalmated Plover with Western Sandpipers in the background