Saturday stats

Start: Selina Commodore Hotel, Astoria, Ore.

End: Anderson Park, Vernonia, Ore. Elevation: 639. This leaves us 50-something miles from downtown Portland, the final final destination of this four-month journey. Tonight is our last night of camping. This was a good penultimate day of riding and a good day to end our camping adventures. Nothing especially unique about today. A good ride. A good evening for camping. 

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The Daily Progress: 62.5 miles. Nice! I was worried that getting back on the road in earnest was going to be rough after so many days with 20 or so miles or less, but this was really not a hard day at all. Go, us!

Uphill / downhill: 2729 / 2060

Ice cream / sweet treats: Macarons after breakfast from the Naked Lemon across the street from the hotel. A chocolate chip cookie on the road (now that's my kinda snack!), also from the Naked Lemon. Churros after dinner. And, of course, dark chocolate peanut M&M's. No wonder I think this was such a good day.

Beer: Kolsch from Gigantic brewery for me, margarita for Dani

Lodging expenses: $28

Food expenses: $24 for snacks at grocery store. $16-ish for drinks. $25 for breakfast at the cafe in the hotel. $5 for churros. $20-ish for dinner at El Amigo food truck in Vernonia.

Dani's daily digest

Sometimes someone, upon learning what we are doing, will say "you should write a book!"

That's a nice sentiment, but I always demur by saying it would be a boring book: "We biked, we ate, we slept. We biked, we ate, we slept."

Today was that kind of day. We biked, we ate, and... we are about to sleep. 

We had breakfast in the cafe in the lobby of our hotel (egg sandwich for me, breakfast burrito for Chris). I also bought two macarons and an enormous chocolate chip cookie from the bakery across the street. Then we climbed the steeeeeeeeeeeeep hill out of Astoria and we were on our way.

I kinda figured that today's ride would be an unpleasant, utilitarian one, since we are no longer on an approved ACA route and instead bushwhacking our way to Portland, but the route was basically ideal. We were on a quiet, two-lane road the whole way. We didn't pass through a single municipality that meets Chris's definition of a "town" (a place with more than two roads). I don't think we passed a single store or gas station. We could ride side-by-side for stretches at a time. 

And the riding conditions were great, too. We enjoyed clouds and comfortably cool weather until the very end, when the skies cleared, the sun appeared, and the air warmed. 

Our day ended in Vernonia's Anderson Park. We took showers, then headed to town for dinner in the patio conjoining a bar and a Mexican food truck. The biggest party on the patio was a 20th high school reunion. This year is the 20th anniversary of my high school graduation. I couldn't believe those middle-aged adult-looking people are my contemporaries. 

We biked. We ate. Time to sleep!