Here we are, almost at the end of the ride, and I believe I did
something for the first time this morning -- I had breakfast "out."
Must be my son's evil influence. We wandered over to the [whatever]
Skillet restaurant right next door to our motel, where I had an
actual, honest-to-goodness breakfast, and Eric executed his plan from
the night before -- pie(*). I resisted the siren song of temptation; I
eschewed(**) the pie. Vittled up sufficiently -- beyond sufficiently,
arguably -- we headed off down the road.
Despite the morning's heavy cloud cover -- a very rare circumstance on
the tour, especially these last few weeks -- we had an excellent and
beautiful 20-mile ride to Vida, downstream along the McKenzie River.
"Vida" means "life," of course, which got me thinking about what a
marvelous and astounding thing life is, which got me thinking about
the amazing intricacies of the human body, which got me thinking that
I'd really like to get some pie inside mine, right now. And there it
was -- the Vida Cafe. Blackberry, with ice cream and coffee;
excellent. Eric had a plateful of bacon. (What's *wrong* with the boy?)
After Vida the traffic got pretty heavy, especially as we got closer
to Eugene, which is the biggest city anywhere on the Trans-Am route, I
do believe(***). Other than the fact that I was riding with my lad
(one of life's great joys), there was not much that was notable about
the rest of the day's ride -- kinda heavy traffic to contend with, and
not much in the way of compensating scenic beauty.
We did have a nice, blogworthy denoument [sp?] to the day, though.
Our original accommodations plan was a truck stop in Coburg, a little
town to the north of Eugene, and a mere 51 miles from the day's
starting point. It seemed like kind of a sketchy proposition from the
get-go -- a truck stop, with a bunch of single rooms, and no
reservations accepted. So the plan was that Steve (driving the van
this day) would try to get there early to make sure we got in. Not
surprisingly, the advance team, Steve and Mike (always the first one
of us to arrive anywhere by bike), determined that the truck stop was,
to put a positive spin on the matter, a "piece of crap." Apparently,
even the manager of the place recommended against our staying there.
Steve and Mike set up a caucus zone on the front porch of a coffee
shop that everyone had to pass by, and posed the following question to
each successive arrival: do you prefer (a) loud/dingy/small/tobacco-
scented truck stop rooms, (b) camping at a KOA campground between the
truck stop and the freeway, or (c) riding an additional 12 miles (on
the route we'd otherwise travel tomorrow anyway) to Harrisburg, and
staying at the almost-brand-new River Bend Resort, with its nice, big
rooms, swimming pool, and hot tub? "Hmmmmm," we each pondered for a
period of time too brief to be measured by the finest of instruments.
The vote was unanimous -- on to Harrisburg.
Eric and I were among the first to arrive at the resort, and the first
to inaugurate the pool and the gi-normous hot tub. (BTW, because we
are so deserving, in the afternoon the clouds parted and the sun came
out.) It didn't take long to draw a crowd, but before anyone else got
there we were treated to a bald eagle fly-over -- my first (and only)
of the trip, although others saw an eagle on the Snake River rafting
excursion. The pool was right next to a river -- the McKenzie, maybe?
-- which also yielded several osprey sightings. Once a football and a
critical mass of people arrived it didn't take long for a synchronized
jump-catch-throw exhibition to evolve -- person A, standing in the
shallow end, throws the ball to person B, standing on the side of the
pool, who jumps in to catch the ball and, mid-flight, throws it to
person C, standing on the other side, who jumps-catches-throws to
person D. Etc. There's no theoretical limit to the number of rounds,
although in the real world the quad (4 jumpers) is the highest
verified level ever achieved(****). We started inauspiciously -- in
our first several attempts the ball never got close to person C -- but
eventually Hugh, Eric, Dennis, and I pulled off a triple. In front of
witnesses, it should be noted, including at least one girl. Girls
aren't the only reason for boys to do stupid stuff, but they certainly
are *a* reason.
Dinner proved to be a little problematic -- the night before we had
decided we would eat out, but that plan assumed we'd be in Coburg, and
a quick scan of our Harrisburg surroundings didn't identify any "out"
to eat at. The only evidence of civilization nearby was a pre-stressed
concrete facility about a half mile away (where I gather they take
calm, relaxed concrete and give it something to worry about), which
did not seem like it was going to meet anyone's food needs. When the
grocery expedition returned, however, they carried reports of a
promising nearby Mexican restaurant, which proved to be muy bueno
indeed.
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(*) For breakfast, if you can imagine such a thing! Who puts such
crazy ideas into kids' heads these days, I wonder?
(**) Possibly my first use ever of the word "eschewed" in written
form. Interesting, how it's got the word "chew" right inside it. Makes
me think about pie.
(***) If only there were a government agency whose mission was to keep
tabs on stuff like this, then I wouldn't have to speculate -- I'd have
definitive data.
(****) Like all major sports these days, it seems, the jump-catch-
throw world is rife with allegations of drug use. Unlike other sports,
however, j-c-t athletes seem drawn to performance-*diminishing*
substances, such as beer. This probably explains why anything beyond a
triple is almost unheard of, and why, in fact, the whole thing often
falls apart at the A-->B stage.
(Sent from my iPhone)
'Twas the Willamette River!
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