E. Oregon and on into Idaho

Cliff Crego

We are camping in the park in Council Idaho, we were invited to go next door to the teen center to listen to a Gwar-isc garage band but after a day like today I am feeling a little antisocial, 30-40 mph headwinds battered us all day long and left me feeling grumpy and demoralized. We decided to take it easy today after a 2000 ft. elevation climb yesterday over Brownlee Summit and thought we'd only hit Council today, but what a 20 mile ride! I cried several times, already feeling sore from the pass, I could not take another second of this maddening wind, we were totally zonked out by the time we got here that it took me several minutes standing  in front of the pizza place for the reality to set in that we'd actually made it. I can't ever remember feeling this tired in my life, I had to struggle to lift my leg over the bike, I felt like I had just dismounted myself off a bucking bronco in a rodeo.  We ate out at One Eye Jack's Pizza, I had the salad bar and everybody else had pizza, this was really special, we never eat out, I really don't mind eating rice and oatmeal but it required more energy to make than I had tonight.  There is so much to talk about since the last time I wrote, we left off in Baker City....We left the park in Baker City and at the advice of some folks we met in the park we headed over to the YMCA where they let us set up tent in their park area and we spent the night swimming which was great fun for the kids, they swam for hours and I took a long shower in the locker room, we turned in early so we could get an edge on the next day.  The next day we woke up with every intention of leaving first thing in the morning but after visiting with some curious people at the Y, we got off late and when we headed down the highway, we got a flat on one of Ryan's tires right there on the interstate and after that was fixed we got off on our exit and start climbing this hill into some really dry, sage brushy type landscape, we are actually following the original Oregon Trail and on the side of the road are the wagon wheel ruts and debri from early travelers and that's cool and all but man, this place looks desolate, from talking to the lady at the Y this morning, she says we are going into some of the prettiest parts of OR and I am beginning to doubt whether she gets out much.  On the horizon is just more and more rolling desert and signs everywhere telling us we are entering Hell's Canyon, I am feeling it.  We begin to descend and things are getting a little greener and all of a sudden a river appears on the scene, and we just keep going down and down forever, it is the trippiest place, bone dry on one side of the canyon and lush and green on the other with the wild Powder River whipping through in a untamed way, loud and foamy with crazy whirlpools and rapids, this place is becoming about one of the prettiest places I have ever seen.  We followed this river for a long time until it was time to turn towards Richland, I was sad to leave Hell's Canyon and felt like I was parting from a dear friend, I wish everybody could see this place but things are getting beautiful in a different way, all of a sudden we are in this sweet green valley with quaint little  farms everywhere and monsterous snowy peaks all around like the Alps, it was raining but it didn't at all destroy the charm.  This area had been damaged badly by floods from heavy rain and snow melt and several farms were half under water, Obby kept telling me how bad he felt for the folks around here and kept bringing up how sad they must be, he was pretty heavy about it.  We came into town and stopped at the store to grab a few things and ask about camping, the park was open to camp in and when we left, I was noticing how low energy the people were in Richland, very somber, I wondered if this was some of the effects of the floods on folks there.  We stayed the night in luxury, we didn't even have to set up the tent because the park had a covered pavilion with carpet, we slept there with our bags on the stage and told stories late into the night. We woke up the next morning and got ourselves ready for taking off when this guy on a bike comes tearing into the park with a camera and tripod on his person, he introduced himself but I missed his name at first because I was so captivated by this guy's energy, he really stood out around here, he had heard about us from the welder in town and was so excited, asking questions and taking pictures a million miles a minute, his name was Cliff Crego and spent most of his time in Amstredam taking pics and composing music, he was sinewy and missing teeth from climbing mountains and was a blast to watch, he lived in the mountains around these parts where he photographs nature and bikes around from camp to camp with 200 lbs. of equipment.  Cliff wanted to know everything, where we were going, what we were carrying, how we found everything, which route we were taking, on and on, he was super charged and I figured him in his fifties, but solid muscle and a dynamo of energy, we talked with him while he had the guys at the welding shop fixing his bike rack, finally we had to leave to charge up the pass, Cliff told us it must have been designed by a Russian tank commander the way it just blasted to the top with maybe one switchback, no messing around with this one, we climbed straight up with amazing views of snow covered peaks and the original pony express wagon tracks right next to the road, pretty amazing spot, took us all day.  We flew down the other side of the mountain into a place called Halfway, a pretty cool little town bursting with charm, looked alot like a village in the Alps, we stopped at a store where the owner told us to set up camp at the local park, when we got there the children made friends with a little girl who was playing there named Jess, her Mom said she could have dinner with us and sent some Jerusalem artichokes and some dill that she had grown back to the park with us that I steamed and made some butter sauce that I made for them, I had never tried these things, they are ugly, tangly root looking things that hardly look edible, but I fell in love with them, I wondered why I'd never had them before, we ate those with sushi and Jess's mom shows up and tells us that we better set up in her yard as they might kick us out of the park, they had a sign there saying there is no overnight camping, we missed that. Jess's mom Louise is a straight up, no nonsense type lady that adopted Jess and her brother and was in her late sixties raising 2 very energetic kids and was a picture of youth and vitality, even though her three children are all grown up with grandchildren of their own, she is starting all over again with these two and doing an amazing job, she had incredible patience and took our whole family in without missing a beat, she had to go dig fence posts the morning we were leaving,  she designed her own house and was working getting a garden area started on top of maintaining her house in town in pristine condition with gardens, animals and a sparkly house, where did she get all of her energy from? She was one busy Mama!  We left her house, she loaded us up with hard boiled eggs from her chickens, and made us waffles from wheat she ground up with apple sauce she made, we were so thankful for all she had done for us and headed down the road with giant black, icky clouds all around, we headed down the road and a couple blocks later discovered Sam's bike rack snapped and we had to stop at the hardware store to find parts to fix it, here comes Louise and Jess with something we had forgotten, she saw we needed a welder and took Ryan all over town to find the guy and when he couldn't be found, she took us back to her house so he could work in her tidy and well stocked shop in the back of her house, she made us lunch and when the repair was done she sent us off with tangerine popsicles and stood outside with Jess and bid us farewell again, what a lady! we will not forget her and Jess.  We started heading along the road and met up with Hell's Canyon again, I was thrilled to be back there and followed it down for miles, we saw lots of smashed  Bull snakes on the road, only one live one, they look  a whole lot like rattlers without the rattle, big and brown, Obby wants to stop and examine each one, I vetoed that, we are making great time and seeing alot of amazing views, we had Oxbow in mind for our next stop, about 40 miles away and we passed Oxbow Dam and headed into Brownlee, a beautiful reservoir supposedly 62 miles long, we stayed at a campground at the base of the Brownlee Dam called McCormick Park at the border of Idaho, they had showers and tons of fishermen in R.V.s, I think this is hilarious, the generators cranking out exhaust so they can watch T.V and eat microwave dinners, there were 3 tent campers, and we made friends with one family there who have been visiting this spot religously for 16-17 years, I met her in the bathroom and she invited us to have breakfast at their site in the morning after asking me alot of questions, everybody here is real freindly, the camp host brought us over some firewood and talked with us for a long time, alot of fishermen were curious and even ventured to come talk to us. We woke up the next morning and had breakfast with Todd and Pam and their two boys Lane and Ryker. Todd was a logger and Pam a medical underwriter from Bonners Ferry, ID, she and the girls made fruit salad, eggs and bacon and taters, we thought this was way better than oatmeal which is what we would have had if they hadn't had us over, they even had apple cider that they made, we were so thankful. We visited with them, Sam rode bikes around this gorgeous park with Ryker and the girls and Obby went fishing with Pam, we were having a blast but eventually we did have to go, we had a 2000 ft. climb to make and the day is wasting away, the girls and Obby all caught a fish, Abby caught a catfish, Lilly caught 2 crappies and Obby hooked a good sized bass, we let that one go as you're not allowed to keep them below the dam, we ate the others, what a great day, we were bummed to leave but had to get going.  We entered Idaho which made us happy and followed Brownlee for awhile and then started up the mountain, Abby and I were riding along the road and up ahead we see a black bear sitting on the opposite side of the road, Abby just keeps peddling, "Abby! Look a bear!" I tell her, thinking she somehow didn't see it, "I know" she says "Let's get out of here" she retorts anxiously, peddling her little guts out.  Everybody else behind us got to see it wait for us to cross and then bolt across the road, Ryan said it looked like it had been attacked by a porcupine.  We kept climbing and climbing until we finally got to the top of the summit, high meadows full of flowers surrounded us and we would have liked to explored around more but at was late and it was getting cold way up here, so we flew down reaching Cambridge, ID in the evening making our best day at 42 miles, we set up camp in the blasting wind in the park under the water tower and woke up to more wind, making breakfast was challenging, a neighbor in a Harley shirt ran over to us bringing hot biscuits and currant jam. We were touched to say the least. We left Cambridge fighting winds the whole way, I couldn't take it, I prayed the wind would let up, we're going down hills and the wind is so strong it was trying to push us back up.  I cried, I wanted this day over with, 20 miles took us all day, about half way we came to Lakey's restaurant and stopped to get a snack and got to talking to an older man there, I did not feel like talking but this guy is so excited that he drags his brother and his wife out of the restaurant to see us and is just about in tears telling us how proud of us he is, this is neat, when strangers are proud of you, it and the french fries helped make me feel a little better. We asked how far to Council, just around the corner, he tells us before they jump in their truck, well, just around the corner took us all day, 11 more miles of horrendous hurricane like winds, I am completely demoralized and right before town we came across another cyclist named Dawson who saw me on the side of the road and came over to chat, "how's at going?" he asks, "don't ask" I tell him, he is going in the opposite direction, loving life with all his tailwind action and tells me that he's been fighting headwinds since he left Baltimore, MD, He's from Providence, Rhode Is. and is 400 miles away from finishing up and very stoked and looking like the picture of health, fit and tan, he is very sympathetic about the headwinds and says he was totally hating them all the way here, he is an Architectural Miller and started out with his buddy and after 800 miles, his friend left him, said he couldn't hack it anymore and he's been solo since, riding with others periodically, he tells me he's got to go back to work in a couple weeks and anticipates a bout of depression over leaving the free and wandering lifestyle, his words sound like music to my soul, he reminds me what it is all about and I feel like he was sent from God to pick up my bedraggled spirit. We say our goodbyes and I feel about 50 lbs. lighter after our chat and find our way into Council here, tired but happy. It is Sunday and we went to the nice little Community church this morning that the older couple from Lakey's invited us to right next to the park we camped in, I thoroughly enjoyed meeting all the friendly and encouraging folks there who asked us if there was anything we needed, our needs are few, I asked if they had an ounce or so of dish soap to fill up our little bottle and they quickly produced a giant blue tub of the stuff telling us we could take the whole thing, we most assuredly didn't need an entire bottle like that but appreciated their thoughtfulness. We couldn't ask for nicer people, one guy at church today tried to talk us into staying and making a home in Council, telling us Ryan could easily find work, and land was cheap, we get this alot, but we definitely want to keep moving, not that living in a town that blasts the Grand Ole Opery over loud speaker doesn't appeal to us but we gotta ramble like they all sing about.