Hank – We had two options for today’s destination. One was a campground 33 miles away. The other was a hotel in Chehalis 50 miles away. We we’re leaning towards the latter because that would give us an easy 34 miles to my aunt’s house in Olympia tomorrow, but we decided we’d see how the day progressed given the elevation gain and the projected headwinds.

Our first task was to cross over the Columbia River into Longview, WA. While that bridge is huge, it’s not the largest one we’ve been on. The shoulder is sufficient but it doesn’t seem to be with all the truck traffic passing by

From Longview we got onto WA Hwy 411 and headed north. We stopped in Vader and had a late lunch at the Little Crane Cafe. From there we took the Winlock Vader Highway to Winlock. Much of the roads we had traveled so far are part of the Seattle to Portland bike ride, which is coming up in a couple of weeks.

We took a break in Winlock where we discovered the world’s largest egg. Winlock used to be a large producer of eggs and touted itself as the egg capital of the country. I reminded Kathy we have also visited the shrimp capital and the frog legs capital of the country.

I remember when Kathy and I rode the Seattle to Portland ride in 2007 that the guide sheet said the police in Winlock would cite cyclists who were speeding or running stop signs. We were on our tandem and coming into town at 32 mph. We had a paceline of 30+ single riders drafting behind us. I pointed out the 25 mph speed limit sign and Kathy said, “We’re taking the ticket.” Fortunately, we were not stopped.

Leaving Winlock we finished off the last of our climbing and worked our way to Chehalis. The headwinds were determined to make us work hard and we did. It was with great relief that we arrived at the hotel.

Kathy – It was another absolutely beautiful day to ride in the Pacific Northwest! We rode 50 miles in partly cloudy/sunny weather. The temps were in the mid 60’s which was nice to keep us cool during our climbing. Total elevation for the day was 1,815 feet. We did have some fierce headwinds, especially during the last ten miles but we just powered through. I must note, in the past two days we rode 102 miles and had over 3,600 feet of climbing and it was not bad at all. The climbing was not difficult and I’m not sore at all. It’s nice, I might actually be ready for that ride across the state of Iowa in a month from now. 😊

Our views were stunning today with all the luscious greenery about us. The mountains surrounded us and they were jammed pack with evergreen trees. We had many lakes and rivers next to us as we rode. The warmth of the partly-sunny/sunny skies felt wonderful on our faces. We saw beautiful summer flowers of every shade imaginable throughout our day of riding. Lastly the wildflowers were abundant everywhere, on the mountainsides, on the roadsides, and on the farmlands. So, the climbing and headwinds really didn’t bother me too much with all this beauty surrounding us. Today I just turned the pedals and enjoyed the ride while listening to Pandora’s “60’s, 70’s and 80’s Hits” (on a low volume) and soaked up the spectacular views. It was as a pretty peaceful ride. ☮️ 🚴‍♀️ 😊

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