A Simple Twisp of Fate

This blog is not exactly chronological so let me recap a few days...Tuesday started rainy and cold so we took a weather day. Our objective was 5500 foot Washington Pass and if it was rainy where we were, it was snowing up in the pass. North Cascades National Park has long held a fashionation for me but Tuesday was a bit dreary. The trees were massive and mossy but we were wearing all our clothes and were still not exactly toasty! We did succeed in reducing the weight of our food supply, fended off cheeky chipmunks, and took a couple of nice walks in the almost deserted campground. No cell reception. Wednesday we were up early, excited and a bit anxious, and were on the road by 7. We guessed we had about 6000 feet of climbing to do in 33 miles then it would be all down hill to the first town. The first grade was a real grinder and after 45 minutes I was starting to think that maybe we were not in good enough shape for the loads we had. Things eased a bit but it was windy and we had to balance the heat we produced by working so hard, the layers were were wearing, and the heat loss from the wind. I think we saw one car in the first hour. After an hour we started seeing snow along the road. It was wild, raw country. Massive granite cliffs and spires, huge waterfalls, and giant avalanche chutes. In many places it was obvious that it had taken a lot of effort to open up the road in April. We made good progress, took a lot of short breaks, and made it to the top by about 1:30. We had a real sense of accomplishment! The descent was really steep so we took quite a few breaks there as well. We stopped in the first little town (Mazama) to get coffee to warm up then continued to a biker only campground. This nice guy wants to support bicycle touring so he lets bikers camp on his property. He has a new composting toilet and an outdoor shower and a picnic table. We cooked up and ate a big meal and got a good night of sleep. In the morning there was sun on the mountains and frost on the tent. By the time we had eaten and packed up it had warmed up and was just starting to rain. Jim said we could stay in the barn if we wanted but we figured as long as we were packed we should make some forward progress. It poured and we set an all-time distance record for loaded touring, for us: 18 miles! (that would be the shortest distance we have covered in a day). We ended up at a very nice inn in the town of Twisp...so nice we doubted that they would want to take in a couple of dripping, drowned-rat bikers! We were wrong; they were very welcoming. AND, a friend of the innkeeper rescued a couple of bikers off the pass that we had crossed the day before (they were stopped by snow and fog) so we got to meet a couple of experienced, but perhaps not so lucky or patient, bikers. We spent today (friday) exploring the Methow Valley and tomorrow we plan to go over Loup Loup pass. There are two more passes after that but we have the biggest one behind us and the weather is supposed to get better...we'll see!