It’s a day - Winterlude 2022 - CycleBlaze

March 5, 2023

It’s a day

Yesterday it looked as if the weather might break our way today and we’d get one last ride on Sauvie Island before we leave - a Sauvie Sunday for the road.   This morning though when I walked back home from the coffee shop, enjoying the fact that my ankle is healed enough that I can walk to destinations like this instead of taking the car, it started lightly raining.  Cold with intermittent rain doesn’t really sound like Sauvie Sunday conditions to either of us, we quickly agree once I’m back home.

And none of the remaining few days we have left here look like biking days either except for Tuesday, which looks fine.  Unfortunately that’s the day I’ll be back in the dentist’s chair, leaning back with my mouth propped open again to receive my three permanent crowns.

This sounds like the right spot to close the cover on this chapter of our lives and turn over a new leaf into the next.  We need to start concentrating on departure tasks so we don’t drop anything or come up short on time at the end.  There’s quite a bit left to do: final visits, haircuts, practice pack, actual pack, return goods to storage, wash the car and give it an oil change before handing it over to Elizabeth for another few months.  Just the usual, but we can’t take it for granted and miss something important.

Thanks for following along again!  We can’t wait to get back on the road again on a real tour, and we can’t wait to see some sun.  Please join us for An Italian Spring!

One more thing we uncovered in storage - some of the patches we collected in our earliest tours. We’d stitch them on to our panniers, until we stopped doing it for some reason. They don’t take up much space so we may as well keep them.
Heart 6 Comment 6
Jacquie GaudetI don't stitch anything onto my waterproof gear and I suspect that might be the reason you stopped too. When our older son was in Scouts, the idea was to stitch badges/patches from events onto a "campfire blanket". I can't remember if we ever followed through...
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1 year ago
Scott AndersonTo Jacquie GaudetIt’s not that, because we’ve never had waterproof bags. Thinking back, I think it was a maintenance issue - they’d come unstitched and start falling off, and when we changed to new bags it wasn’t worth the bother to move them. And, I think we may have lost some with the pannier we lost in Spain along with our passports.
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1 year ago
Jacquie GaudetUnpicking and resewing would be too much for me!
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1 year ago
Graham FinchThe saddlebag I use now has lots of badges on - it was one Debbie used on a tour of Europe back in 2005.
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1 year ago
Keith AdamsMy patches got sewn onto a nylon windbreaker, until I filled it up. Next I filled up a windbreaker vest. I have several more waiting for the next garment.

Last summer I switched to pins, which I mount on a pannier. My panniers, like yours, are Cordura and not the rubberized waterproof sort so there's no worry about poking small holes in them.
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1 year ago
Patrick O'HaraFrame them! But, I suppose you need a wall to hang it on. Scratch that!
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1 year ago
On the wall in Korcula, 2001. One more task on my todo list before we go is to retrieve photos for that tour from our backup drive so I can load them into a journal where we can see them again. You can look too, if you’d like.
Heart 4 Comment 0
It’s definitely time. It wouldn’t hurt to get my eyebrows trimmed back while I’m at it.
Heart 4 Comment 0
Actually, she looks great this way. It will be easier for her to manage on the road though if she gets it shortened first.
Heart 4 Comment 3
Steve Miller/GrampiesWe think Rachael always looks great. A shorter cut will be easier to manage for her though.
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1 year ago
Ron SuchanekYou look marvelous!
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1 year ago
Rate this entry's writing Heart 11
Comment on this entry Comment 7
david alstonIn anticipation of adding German to the curriculum of Park City High School where I was teaching at the time, I was invited by the Goethe Institute to attend an intensive two week seminar held on the campus of Lewis and Clark College. Intensive meant that we only had two days off the whole time and these were the two Sundays. It rained every day for the whole two weeks except for the two Sundays. So I had two Sauvie Sundays although I spent one of them watching the ski team kids ski on the Mt. Hood glacier. I maxed the other one, however, by pedaling to and from the island. Going was fine, a little traffic, but there were some stiff climbs on the way back. So, two weeks and two Sauvie Sundays.

David Alston
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1 year ago
Scott AndersonTo david alstonPretty exceptional, arranging for your only dry days to come on your day off. And you’re right, there are a few rollers on the way to the island and back. Great once you’re out there but kind of Ma slog getting there.
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1 year ago
Keith AdamsThe link to Another Italian Spring doesn't work: it goes to the editable version, I think, not the read-only public view.
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1 year ago
Scott AndersonTo Keith AdamsThanks, Ed!
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1 year ago
Keith AdamsTo Scott AndersonNP. It works now.
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1 year ago
Janice BranhamGood luck with your remaining preparations. Looking forward to following you on una primavera italiana.
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1 year ago
Scott AndersonTo Janice BranhamThanks, Janice! We can hardly believe it’s so close now. Somehow this ways comes as a surprise at the last minute.
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1 year ago