Sunday 21 August 2011

Day 80: Back on the road again


Day 80
Eugene to Corvallis 44miles

Possibly my latest ever start today – didnt get on the road until nearly 10am! Felt good to be honest.
After a couple of days where I hadnt really ridden anywhere, today was a nice easy re-introduction to the world of cycle touring.

The first part of the ride, leaving Eugene, was a little stop-start. Whilst within the city, the road was clearly quite a main one (although very empty on a Sunday morning), so there were sets of traffic lights at almost every intersection. Once I got a few miles down the road though it went down to a single lane and then it was plain sailing.

And today's ride was pretty darn easy! For almost the entire way the road was dead flat. We're talking Kansas-esque here. In fact it was actually on the gentlest of downhill grades all the way. It dropped around 1metre a mile, so not exactly steep. And in fact by the time I reached Corvallis I was actually at the lowest elevation since the first few days – currently around 65metres above sea level. Although I will climb slightly tomorrow.

Despite not setting off till 10, I arrived in Corvallis by 1pm. Probably for the first time on the entire trip I started from, and arrived in, a town with a population of at least 50,000 people. Corvallis is another college town, this time it's Oregon State University. And just like the University of Oregon, they also have a less than scary name for their sports team. And this one comes with added immature snickering. Here we have the Oregon State Beavers! Go Beavers! I guess it actually makes sense – the American beaver is the official state mammal of Oregon (all states have lots of 'official' things like birds, rocks, trees, fish etc.), so when it came to naming the team was on obvious choice. If only they were able to see into the future... I also saw a sign for the BeaverBus today – which sounded great fun!

Went and had a look round campus, but it was pretty quiet. I guess in a couple of weeks it will be heaving with lots of eager beavers as the new year starts.

It was good to get back on the bike after a couple of days off. Im now less than 200miles from Astoria, so it's starting to feel really, really close. Just have to decide how close to get to the coast tomorrow.

Apologies for the lack of photos recently – I'll try and take some nice ones tomorrow. Once I hit the coast I'm sure I'll be taking loads!

1 comment:

  1. 8 days to go until i see you at the finish now!

    I cant believe you have almost finished

    well done

    ReplyDelete