Day 1 - Troutdale to The Dalles

Day one started the previous night when I had to do the 26 mile round trip back home to pick up my cell phone. While I was there, I also found my sunglasses which I'd managed to leave behind... Good job I used my checklist eh?

This morning was a 'late' start for the tour as we got to 'sleep in' until our 6:30am breakfast.

We rolled out of the hotel at 7:15 with a ceremonial escort for some of the guys from my cycling team. Thanks John, Mark, Saul and Tom. The first few miles were nice and mellow as we headed out to Sandy on Hwy 26 and our first rest stop at Rhodedendron. Being smarter than me, the Half Fast Velo boys turned round and headed for home.

On the climb up to Government Camp, it started to get warm. For a brief moment there, a few of us thought about taking the side trip up to Timberline lodge... After calculating that this would involve a 6 mile climb and another 2000 feet elevation gain, we saw the error of our ways.

Between Government Camp and the turn of for the Meadows ski resort, we saw hundreds of butterflies that apparently had a death wish. I'm not sure what type of butterflies they were but if you check out my flickr page maybe you can tell me.

After lunch, my full belly helped in the descent off of Mt Hood on Hwy 35. Apparently I didn't eat enough though as I then swallowed a bug whole and spent the next 5 minutes trying to free the beast.

Hwy 44 had a few miles of climbing and then a beautiful 15 mile descent down into Dufur. The scenery went from Douglas fir trees to Ponderosa pine, sage brush and then wheat fields in the blink of an eye.

This is when things started to go pear shaped. It's only 14 miles from Dufur to the Dalles but, we hit ferocious head winds and somebody turned on the oven. Riding down the final descent into the Dalles is supposed to be a super fast road. I had to stand up and pedal to hit 18mph. Riding through downtown The Dalles, I saw a temperature gauge reach 94 degrees. It made me so happy that I'd worn my all black cycling team kit.

Several cold showers later, we chose to ignore the recommended restaurants for dinner and went to Cousins. You know a place is going to be good when the door clucks, baahs and moos when you open it. The large John Deere tractor in the restaurant didn't hurt either. One pot roast, large vanilla shake and two hefeweisens later, we waddled back to the hotel.

Time to start getting things ready for tomorrow as breakfast is at 6am.