Stevenson Epic

Hood and the road we climbed, courtesy Jason

It's been nearly a year since my last blog entry. There have been some great adventures since my trip around Mount St Helen's, but nothing seemed quite epic enough to write about - until yesterday.

Let me back up two weeks. On May 21, a local bike organization called VeloDirt offered up an enticing ride called The Rapture - 68 miles of gravel and dirt roads in the coast range with 7500 feet of climbing. How could we resist? Patty, Ross, and I camped the night before and were joined by Jason, Jen, and Nick the next morning. Some of us opted for an early start, anticipating some tough road ahead. We were not disappointed. After 3000 feet of climbing we began a steep, gravelly, and slick descent. Unfortunately for us, God chose that time to rapture Ross's brakes. Disappointed but reasonable, he and I left the woods after 27 miles and found a guardian angel to drive us 2 hours back to our campsite to greet the victors that afternoon.

Jason and Patty had a spectacular adventure full of wild country, rough road, and knees that went well beyond "skinned". Fast forward to Friday, June 3. Jason offers me a chance at redemption. Via Google maps, he has scouted out a 40ish mile adventure in the Gorge, a mini-rapture or Second Coming if you will. He and Dave plan to leave in the morning, and Patty and I eagerly jump on the band wagon.

Fortunately for all involved, Jason did a little extra work Friday night to look at topo maps. Yeah, those two roads that came really close together on Google maps - they were actually separated by a waterfall. He does some rerouting and prints each of us our very own highlighted map. He and Dave also get their GPS units set up with the route.

At 9am, full of donuts and chocolate milk, we leave the comfort of the parking lot in Stevenson and begin our first climb. A small stop for a mangled chain before we're even out of town, and within 15 minutes we were in the woods and off the pavement.

The climb started out like a dream. Slow and steady, but good hard packed dirt and gravel. We climbed for a good long time, the next 10 miles or more. At around mile 10, we were stopped by a young, disoriented guy who said he'd lost his way and had been wandering around for hours. We tried to direct him back to Stevenson, but he was insistent he wanted to get back to his campsite, much farther into the forest. Patty gave him water and a candy bar, and I ceded my map and wished him luck. As we pushed forward, we placed arrows in the road to help him find his way. About 15 minutes later, a police car approached from behind. He stopped, and I asked him if he'd found the lost man on the road behind us. Turns out this wasn't any lost camper, but a criminal suspect - I didn't hear what for. I wonder if we were aiding and abetting?

The climb continued and the road began to get a bit rougher. We missed a turn and could have continued on for a shorter day but opted to turn back and complete the planned route. That's when Patty got a flat. No big deal. We patched it up and found our road in no time. "Road" is perhaps a misnomer. What we actually found was a long steep downhill of grass, logs, ditches, and creeks. At one point, we thought the road petered out entirely - in actuality it just became a creek for a short while, and we followed it carrying our bikes cross style.

Back out on "real" road, we discovered Patty's tire had gone flat again. Jason and Dave spent an hour or more painstakingly going over the tube and patching it, mostly unsuccessfully. All in all, there were 4 holes - two so close together we needed one large patch to cover them. But then again, there may have been more. Two minutes down the road, it was flat again. With no spare tubes her size, Jason, Dave, and Patty working together managed to make a mountain bike tube work, and we were flat free for the rest of the day.

Time was not on our side at this point. We'd done less than half of the ride, and it was probably close to 3. But we pushed forward making up some time going downhill before turning north to climb again. That's when we saw our first patch of snow. It was a pretty sight at first, but we were quickly walking our bikes through it. It was just a few short patches at that point, and we continued to make decent progress. By 4:30 we only had 12 miles or so to go.

That's when things got hard. More climbing - much of it unrideable for me. More snow. An hour later, we hadn't made as much progress as we'd hoped when we arrived at a radio tower with stunning views of Hood, Jefferson, Adams, Rainier, and Helen's. We were probably at our highest point there with a few thousand feet still to descend. Our road didn't really exist here - it was so narrow and covered in snow. I secretly wondered whether Jason and Dave had decided to go off GPS and just get us down the mountain faster. But now and then, the snow would clear and I could see there was some semblance of road below. Breaking trail and pushing bikes, we were making 1/2 mile an hour progress.

At 7:00 we finally cleared the snow and began descending earnestly. Exhausted and jarred, I managed a few small falls - nothing spectacular. But enough to make the day stop being fun for awhile. As Patty says, it was a "three-cryer" for me. Even St Helen's only warranted one breakdown. But with the sun fading, I didn't take the time to stop - just barreled down the hill, occasionally sobbing, my face now a mix of tears and chain grease. At that point, I knew we were ok - we weren't going to be spending the night in the Oregon woods. But I just wanted to be done already.

I should have stopped and taken pictures of the pain, but you will just have to imagine it. We finished around 8:30 and headed to the nearest brew pub to refuel. I joked a lot that I'd never follow Jason into the woods again, but the truth is I know I will. A little better prepared next time. My friends are an amazing crew, and I hope there will be lots of adventures ahead. And now for the pretty pictures:

Epic Pics