Today we ride hard and long to get back to the route at Ovando after our detour around the forest fires. We follow Highway 200 East along rolling hills and I tuck in close behind Dave’s wheel to draft and keep up. He’s fast and powerful, but when I stay in the draft I feel that way too. Hill after hill we climb hard and enjoy the downhill coast and breeze. It’s a hot day and I’m going through my water fast. At lunch we stop at a convenience store in the middle of nowhere farm country and I down nearly a liter of orange juice. Back on the road we make good time.

In the evening the sky is darkening quickly; a storm is building ahead of us and we see lightning flash again and again. We know that our destination, Ovando, is just up ahead. Another hill–we’re closer. Another hill–it’s gotta be soon. Another hill–oh, please let it be that next road!

And finally, it is.

Or is it? A gravel road off the highway to a town? Yes. We round a corner and see a hotel, a cafe, a volunteer fire station. A couple houses here and there. I ask Dave, “Should we ask about camping over at the hotel?” and he replies, “Let’s take a look at the town first.”

“This is it,” we hear a man on the hotel porch say. “There ain’t nothin’ else for you to see, you’ve made it.”

He’s the hotel owner, come out to watch the storm. They’ve been hot and dry for way too long, fires are raging in the state, and they’re anxious to feel a few drops. We get there just in time to step under the porch for those few drops to fall. That’s it, just a few. After the rain we set up a free camp in the yard by the museum and Dave gets started on dinner.

The lightning keeps on flashing for quite a while and soon we see the fire truck drive out to take a look. A long while later they come back and we hear the guys whooping it up in the station. Another adrenaline rush and something to talk about.

After dinner we start cleaning up and going about our routine. About that time someone emerges from the old wood house across the road. He waves and ambles across the gravel. He’s wearing a work shirt and hitched up jeans, a big straw cowboy hat with a couple feathers adorning each side. Big ones. He’s got that gum-mashing look of someone who lost his teeth some time back.

He asks us about our ride, then starts talking about the fires. We both realize he may not be working with a full deck as he mixes up some of the obvious facts and talks pretty slow. That’s OK, we’re enjoying his friendliness and the history of the town that he’s sharing with us. We get his history too. He’s lived there 17 years. He’s a handyman. Gets around by bike. Has lived through two house fires, one of which he mixes up in his head with the blast from Mount St. Helens (we think they must have happened on the same day).

He tells us there’s only been four bears to grace the town; none caused any problems and they were only passing through. We get the story of the tree that would have gone straight through the museum wall here if they hadn’t cut it down. No, that slice of old tree in the museum showcase is from down the road. He asks if we’re friends, married, or single. I reply that we’re close enough to ride 2,500 miles together. He replies, “Yup. Uh huh,” with a nod.

He doesn’t seem to notice that we’ve cleared the dishes, put everything away in our panniers (it’s threatening to rain, hard this time) and we’ve actually brushed and flossed our teeth right there in front of him. I tell him thanks for sharing the town history with us, we’re getting pretty tired from biking all day. Still he sits. Says a few more things about fires, town, now I can’t remember. By this time it’s dark and it’s actually starting to rain. We throw the last few things in the tent and thank him again, wish him a good night, jump in the tent.

We already know that he’ll be up another four or five hours, as he likes to stay up till three or four in the morning because he just doesn’t sleep at night.

We also know that he’s the mayor. When he told us, Dave asked if he was elected. “No,” he says, “I was appointed.”

We didn’t ask by who.

42 miles, 5 hrs riding, 7 hours with breaks.

Today started out on pavement so it was a nice warmup with the loaded bikes on easy roads. It turned out to be a fairly hot day as we got a late start, but the rolling hills gave us a nice breeze now and then. As the day went on we moved on to dirt and gravel roads, with nearly 3,000 feet of climbing through the mountains. I wasn’t feeling ready for the climb in that heat, and actually laid down to cool off at the top of the pass near the end of the day. Dave was patient over and over, waiting for me and giving encouragement. He said he felt it too, though he was obviously stronger than I. We had a quiet spot at the nearly empty campground, though in the evening other cyclists on the route came to say hi. They started in Canada and would be finishing the next day or two.

That night I was nervous about bears because the book said the area is so remote that they often relocate unruly bears there from other parts of the state. We hung our food and settled in for the night with the bear spray in the tent at the ready.

Some time near 2 am we heard some rustling nearby. Dave got out to check it out but didn’t see anything. I went back to sleep but I guess Dave couldn’t knowing something was messing around the campsite. At about 3 am there was more rustling, a sort of digging sound and some thumping. Again, Dave gets the spray and his headlamp and looks around. At 3:30 he heard it again and said, “Hey bear!” to announce his presence. Again he looked, again he could see nothing. Then at nearly 5 am he heard it again, and as he popped out of the tent, ready with the pepper spray he paused. “What is it?” I said. “It’s a deer,” he said, and I had to have a look. Yep, it was a dang deer giving us a fright all night. It wasn’t afraid of us, and later that morning I had to throw a couple rocks at it because it kept coming nearer and seemed aggressive or something. Menacing deer! Argh!

Photos by Rich Snowberg. Click to see full size.