Bandon to Gold Beach - 58 miles

Even though it started off with a little rain and wind, today's ride was breathtaking.  Here is a shot Mike took of me along the coast.  I am but a speck of dirt among the scenery..

We rode along the coast for the entire ride  (except for one place where we had to go around (not over) Humbug Mountain.  It was another day where you had to pick your spots to stop and take pictures - or you would have never finished the ride there were so many fantastic views.  

While the ride was only 58 miles long, we did climb close to 3000 feet.  The side of the road was pretty good for riding, though there were a couple of RVs that passed that had not pulled in their stairs.  These can be really deadly and can literately sweep you off your bike if the RV's are hugging the white line. Unfortunately you can't see the danger until they pass you.

A couple of the rocks have some neat names.  Here is face rock (look on right side of rock)...

Here is Monkey rock.  It was either Hugging or Loving Monkey rock (but I forgot to write it down)...

The coast is pretty jagged and the road is constantly getting attacked by the ocean waves.  I keep wondering what Oregon is going to do if the ocean wins one of these days and part of Route 101 falls into the sea.  On the second day we did have to bypass part of the road - and it has been closed for at least a couple of years. As I can attest, a lot of logging trucks and trailer trucks use 101 as their main route so by-passing 101 would be very time consuming.  In some cases it would seem that a tunnel would be the only solution - pretty expensive solution.

I passed a lot of riders whose bikes are really loaded with their tents, sleeping bags, etc. Some are pulling trailers.  Most started in Canada and are riding to Mexico.  As they tend to be a lot slower given the amount of weight they are pulling, you tend to pass the same riders each morning (as most stop in the same towns as we do).  One guy was from Switzerland and one of my ride mates stopped to talk to him and found out he is in his late 70's.  He had to be carrying 40 pounds of stuff.  Add in his bike and he was pushing a good 60-70 pounds of gear.

The ride to Gold Beach was quick and even though we did not start until 9 am due to the rain,  I got to the hotel at about 2 pm.  We are staying at a place called the Beachcomber - and from the outside it looked like it was going to be a real bust.  But when I opened up the door to my room - there was this huge, big, fluffy bed.  The room had a sliding glass door and deck which looked right out on the ocean.  The sound of the waves crashing on the beach was fantastic and it was a glorious sleep.

I skipped the team dinner as it was at a Mexican restaurant and instead opted for a local steakhouse.  Sat at the bar and had a great duck dinner.  Had to listen to some guy complaining about global warming to a fully agreeing RV couple whose rig probably only gets 4 miles to the gallon (if you haven't figured out by now I am not a fan of these big ass RV's).   But other than this pain in the ass spouting off I am glad I skipped the tacos.  Just was not up for chips and salsa.

Today we have another 55 miler (with another 3000 feet of vertical).  We leave Oregon and head in to California ending up at Crescent City.  Tomorrow we have our first rest day (second for me).  We pick up 6 more riders on the lay-over day (two couples from Germany plus two other riders).

First order of business upon arrival is laundry.  Hopefully there is a laundromat in town as I suspect this is the first order of business for everyone (but a lot easier than when there are 40 riders trying to use one washing machine).

Again lots of shots below, too many to comment on each of them.   Probably won't blog tomorrow on the day off.