Two more days in the bank

We were too tired to post last night, so here's a summary of the last two days! The trip has continued to be great fun! Yesterday, we rode 75 miles from St. Helens to Welches on a route that took us through Portland, along the Columbia river, and with fabulous views of Mt. Hood. The roads were great, with nice wide shoulders, and although there was more climbing than on the previous day, the grade was nice and mellow and it wasn't too hard. We took our time on this ride, since there were lots of great views and photo-ops along the way, and after four hours of riding we stopped with a bunch of fellow riders for lunch at a great little place in Sandy, OR. From there, we had a bit of climbing left to do, but only about 15 miles to our next hotel, a resort at the foot of Mount Hood. We all went out for a Chinese buffet dinner about 3/4 of a mile down the road from the resort (we were skeptical, but the food was actually pretty healthy and quite tasty!), and then a horde of us, not satisfied with fortune cookies for dessert, went to a supermarket across the way for various ice-cream treats.

This morning, we woke up EVEN earlier than the last two days (if you can believe it!), and embarked on a 63 mile ride to Warm Springs, OR. This ride had a little bit of everything. There was lots of climbing, including a long, 11 mile climb right from the start. There were more fabulous views of Mt. Hood, and later in the day we saw several other snow-capped peaks, including Mt. Jefferson. It was beautiful. Around mile 45 the vegetation changed really quickly as we entered the desert. The temperatures went up, and the scenery began to look more like New Mexico or Colorado than the green, foresty Oregon we've experienced over the last few days. Our route was pretty desolate - not much around except a small convenience store at mile 50 where Joel ate a pretty sketchy-looking meat burrito (here's hoping it doesn't come back to haunt him...) About 13 miles later, after an AMAZINGLY fun descent down into this canyon, we arrived at the Indian Reservation/Resort/Casino where we're spending the night. After a nice shower and nap, we enjoyed a yummy pasta dinner, took a group picture with the other 73 riders, and now it's bedtime, as we have another early morning tomorrow!

Night!