Gettin dirty on U.S. 30

Longview WA —> Lake Oswego OR   68.3

Our longest day yet. But fewer hills then yesterday so it wasn't too bad. We got off to quite an interesting start though—Chris, our couchsurfing host last night, lived up on this big ol' hill outside of Longview which we had to climb yesterday (a nice little end to the day), so we got to go down it this morning. Two things happened in quick succession: first, my (this is Pat) chain came off as I was up-shifting, so Sam passed me as I fixed it, and then a minute later a deer popped out of the side of the road right in front of him. It looked like it was gonna jump out in front of him, which needless to say would have been ugly for both parties, but at the last second it ran back into the bushes. First time we've almost hit a deer on a bicycle.

Shortly after, we crossed the Lewis and Clark Bridge over the Columbia River, which divides Washington and Oregon. This was slightly hazardous. The shoulder narrowed substantially, and there was construction happening on the bridge which eventually eliminated the shoulder altogether. The guy holding the stop/slow sign had to stop traffic so we could use the main part of the road and not get creamed by passing cars. And trucks. LOTS of big trucks. Speaking of Lewis and Clark, fun fact about Sam and Pat. Sam's distantly related to Meriwether Lewis and I'm distantly related to William Clark. How 'bout it. That must be why we're friends.

After crossing into Oregon, we headed onto the U.S. 30 - East. I think this is the first time I've ever taken a ramp onto a freeway on my bicycle. Exciting. We stayed on this highway for a real long time, probably about 40 miles. Definitely the most time spent on one road so far. Luckily, it had a great shoulder most of the time, and it went through some towns, so it was neither monotonous nor life-threatening. And the mountains. Oh man. There was hardly a cloud to be seen today, and about 15 miles away from Portland, we got a view of St. Helens, Mt. Adams, and Mt. Hood all at the same time. What a sight. Not to play favorites, but Mt. Hood is a seriously badass looking mountain. And I'm from Alaska, so I'm qualified to make these judgements. Go mountains.

As shameless music geeks, we entertained ourselves along the U.S. 30 today by observing the Doppler Effect between our eardrums and passing cars. In a nutshell, the Doppler Effect is the name for the effect that velocity has on the frequency (or pitch) of a sound. The classic example is of a police siren passing you. As it comes towards you, the velocity of the police car causes the sound waves that approach you (the observer) to stack up closer together than they would normally, since sound travels through air at 343 meters/second no matter how fast the source of the sound is moving. This causes the frequency of the sound to be greater than it would be if the source of the sound were not moving. As the police car passes you, it's velocity moving away from you causes the sound waves traveling towards you to be further apart than they would be if the siren were stationary. Today we noticed that with our speed (approximately 13-17 mph) and the speed of the cars (approximately 45-50 mph), the sound of the traffic passing us from behind lowered about a major second as it passed us, while the sound of the oncoming traffic lowered by about a minor third. I wish I could remember the equations from the physics of music class I took to figure out if that's as it should be, but I don't. And researching it sounds like a lot of work. My sincerest apologies to everyone who didn't at all understand this paragraph. Just ignore it. It's not important.

When we finally rolled into Portland, we made our way downtown to the Rogue Brewing public house, in the Pearl District. If you live in Portland, like beer and food, and haven't been there, GO. Some of my favorite beer in the world, and the food isn't far behind. We met up with Leo, a UPS buddy of ours, and Sam's old friend from San Fran named Chris. Great people, great beer, great food. It's a tough life.

Leo's getting Lazik tomorrow. Good luck buddy!

But we still had some miles to go to Lake Oswego, where we are currently staying the night with Dave and Kathy Ernst, our great friend Brian Ernst's folks. And what a stay it's been. Showers, laundry, some kick-ass lasagna, cookies, ice cream, strawberries, hummus, beer, wine, a dip in the neighbor's hot tub, a quick hello to John Lampus (another UPS bro), more beer. Maybe more cookies too, I can't decide. Man, if these guys had a couch surfing profile it would be spotless. But soon they'd have a house full of tons of rambling travelers, because no one would want to leave. And we couldn't have that. Sam is VERY excited to sleep in Brian's bed tonight. It's a running joke. We're currently wearing his clothes since ours are in the laundry. Clouds too. You're welcome Bri.

It will be tough to tear ourselves away tomorrow morning, but we're on a schedule. Monmouth bound! Onward and upward. Well, downward I guess.

And, the moment you've all been waiting for. The Special Sam Moment of the Day:
As we were biking on the 30 today, Sam took a drink from a water bottle, but as he went to put it back into the holder on his frame, he missed, it fell, and I (being right behind him) ran over it. It was busted, so we pulled over at the next gas station for him to grab some more liquid and he threw it away. He got a Gatorade, one of the fat 24 oz. bottles. He then tried to see if it would fit into the now-empty water bottle holder. It CLEARLY didn't. I said, "Sam, what are you doing... Sam, that's not gonna work... Sam... dude, Stop!" but he kept jamming it in there, and a second later the whole water bottle holder snapped. He then had to spend like 15 bucks on a new holder at a swanky bike store in Portland. I swear every bike in there was worth at least 5 g's. And they were out of water bottles. Ouch.