Under the Oregon Sun

Lake Oswego --> Monmouth
61.3 mi

Man it was a hot day! We got a bit of a late start because Bernie's bed was just too goddamn comfortable. Ms. Ernst had a full breakfast waiting for us downstairs. The Ernst's were the most welcoming hosts, and it was soooo good to see these friends of ours. We missed Bernie, but had too much fun with his parents to think about him very much. Except when I was in his bed. Then I thought about him real hard.


Around 2 PM, we stumbled across an Oasis by the name of Jones's Farm Produce. We bought some dried apple slices and had our lunches (which were packed in the morning by Ms. E). It was a good lunch. Followed by icecream. Which in retrospect was dumb.

Almost immediately after lunch we whirled by Volcano Stadium. THIS IS A BIG DEAL!!! The Keizer Volcanoes are the single-A affiliate team of the San Francisco Giant's franchise! I was wearing my Giants bike jersey so it was a powerful moment for me. I hadn't realized that we would bike right by it.

As soon as I got over my excitement, I realized that EZ Orchards sits west 1 mile from the stadium. EZ Orchards belongs to our good friend and fellow GL alum Tristian Zielinsky's family. They took us in when we were on tour in '11, AND let us crash there for a week while we recorded our album in Eugene. TO THIS DAY, I have never tasted cider better then the EZ hard cider. We had to say hello. So we did! It was so wonderful to see Mr. Z, and it was great to remember the sweet memories we had established at this site:

The last 15 miles were kinda brutal. It was 5:30 PM and 85 degrees. Patrick was suffering from some nasty allergies and completely covered in his own snot. I had managed to tweak something in my right knee early on and it had gotten pretty swollen. But we hung in there and trudged through some sweltering conditions until will saw this sign.

That felt good.

Tonight we are staying with YET ANOTHER GARDEN LEVEL FAMILY! This time the one belonging to Alex King. John and Harriet Courts are just fantastic. We hadn't really met them before, but they took us under their wing right away, let us use their shower and drink their beer, and cooked us a fabulous Italian dinner. God, it was just a real treat to hang out with them tonight. Ms. Courts got me some medicine for my knee. I've got it all wrapped up and it feels great. Gettin eager to see how it feels on the bike.


The Past 24 hours we've spent three Garden Level families, without any of their actual children being with them. We feel incredibly fortunate to have these people in our lives. Thank you too Brian, Tristan and Alex, for sharing your incredible parents with us.

One more thing: I've added a Beer count component to our blog. We are at 20 pints. Gotta make sure we're getting our calories.


Much love! And as always, Go Giants




Pretentious Pat Moment of the Day (as pointed out by Maddog)
Yesterday Pat wrote a huge paragraph describing the intricacies of the Doppler Effect, but INSTEAD of apologizing at the end for being a nerd, he apologized for the people that wouldn't understand.