Winds of Change
Another particularly rocky stretch - East of Marengo, WA
The previous evening, the weather had intensified in the form of strong, sustained winds. While wind typically isn’t good for cycling, this wind was at the head of a warm front, ushering in much higher temperatures than we’d contended with the previous day. Though since it was coming out of the east, the direction we were predominately heading, that meant we’d be riding into a headwind. So while the cycling would be more difficult, we at least wouldn’t be freezing or getting snowed on. And even better, there was a zero percent change of precipitation, so there wouldn’t be any rain either. Overall, it was supposed to be a decent day.
To make things even better, Zilla and I were in for a treat, pavement! We’d last been on pavement west of Lind when Captain was still with us and we’d crashed the drone, but even then, it had only been about 3 miles and today would be a whopping 7.5 miles! It would be our longest stint on pavement since dodging all the vegetables around Othello and Warden.
(click photos to enlarge and see descriptions)
Even though the winds were a sustained 25 mph or more, there was enough sun shining on us that it was actually warm enough for me to sweat, though this probably had something to do with the fact that I was pedaling into the headwind as well, making our progress very slow. I didn’t mind however, even though we were on pavement, it was a quiet enough road that we saw very little traffic. All of which was nice enough to slow down and move over when passing us I might add. Though desolate, there was still enough scenery to make it interesting. We passed a dried lake bed, or so the sign said. Though not picture worthy, the apparent presence of water in the ground led to some strange plants that we’d never seen before. They were about 6 feet tall and looked like something straight out of the mind of Dr. Seuss.
After a few miles on the “busier” road, we turned on to the road to Marengo, WA where our detour would join the trail proper. As soon as we turned onto Marengo Road, we were greeted by a small herd of cows grazing in a small pen. The cows seemed interested in us, so we stopped for a minute to watch them. That’s when I noticed that one of the cows only had one horn. I’m sure this is fairly common, but since I don’t hang out with cows much, I thought it was worthy of a picture. Besides, this will probably be the only time these cows ever have their pictures taken, so why not?
The wind gusts really started picking up at this point, but they were now more of a cross wind that was throwing me all over the road. I was very thankful that we didn’t have any traffic to contend with. I was also glad to lose the headwind as Marengo Road has a very steep set of hills and I didn’t need any extra difficulty factor when trying to climb them. There was however a loose black farm dog that was standing in the middle of the road barking at us. As we approached it, it didn’t quite know what to make of us and decided it was best to run off into the field beside us and keep pace, barking as we rode. The dog eventually lost interest and went back to its house, which coincidentally was the start of the climb.
I did my best to ride up the steep road, but it soon became obvious that this wasn’t going to be doable, so I got off and started to push. The road had been completely devoid of traffic up to this point, so I felt safe enough letting Zilla out of the trailer to walk for a bit so he could go to the bathroom and help lighten my load. Even so, we stopped for a short break about halfway up the hill. This was partly because I was getting tired and more so because there was a small cut in the hill that provided refuge from the constant 25+ mph winds. It was great to have a few wind free moments, soaking up the warmth of the sun, and just hanging out with Dogzilla. Eventually, I put Zilla back in the trailer and we finished the climb as we got close to a large radio tower or cell tower of some sort.
The battle with the hills wasn’t entirely over though as the road traversed the hill in a straight line instead of following the contours of the land, so there were still a few steep valleys and peaks to contend with, but we’d completed the hardest part. The view from the top was pretty cool, we were able to spot the summit of Mt. Spokane some 50 of so miles away and close to the Idaho border. There were also some smaller peaks to the east, though I didn’t think we were close enough to the border for them to be part of Idaho. After a few quick pictures, we took advantage of the elevation we’d gained and started coasting down towards the old the train stop of Marengo.
As expected, the “town” was gone before I could blink, though this probably had something to do with the fact that we were doing more than 30 mph on the steep downhill. After passing the granary, we were back to the trail proper for the Palouse to Cascades/Great American Rail Trails. I was pretty tired from all the steep hills we’d been on, so I decided to take about a 90 minute lunch break with Zilla to regain some of my strength. The rest of the day would be flat, but we’d be back on the rocky trail so it wasn’t going to be easy.
After our break, we continued with our adventure. I was still tired, but I wanted to make a few more miles. It was getting late in the day and the wind wasn’t really letting up, so I knew it was going to be a tough couple of hours. We sadly left the smooth roadway and resigned ourselves to a couple more miles of bouncing on the rocks. I tried to stay positive, but the combination of being tired, back on the beat-up trail, and going directly into a headwind while the temperatures started to drop wasn’t exactly a recipe for a wonderful end to the day.
Zilla and I took frequent breaks in the rock cuts whenever they protected us from the wind and even though the trail was flat, more than once I got off the bike and decided to push it instead. Dogzilla is always more than happy to walk, so he didn’t mind, but I was starting to get a little frazzled with the seemingly endless poor quality trail. I started dreaming of an upcoming section in Idaho named the Trail of the Coeur d’Alenes which is ≈75 miles of nothing but paved bike trail. Oh how I wanted to be on a nice, flat, paved bike path right then. And maybe have a nice BBQ joint right along the trail too that served cheap beer! If only! Instead, it was just a few more hours of Zilla and I fighting subpar conditions at 2-3 mph.
About the only thing noteworthy we saw during this stretch was a bird’s egg in the middle of the trail. I was surprised I’d been able to spot it with all the thousands of similarly shaped rocks around it. I then had to wonder where the egg came from as there were no obvious nests nearby. It must have been stolen and accidentally dropped by the thief. Nature at work.
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t happy when the day was over. The hills had been steeper than I’d imagined, the wind had been relentless, the trail had been predictably bad, and overarching all of this, I was still struggling with continuing the journey without Captain. I missed her so much.
My morale was plummeting fast.
Stark desolation, mirroring my mental state at the time - east of Marengo, WA.
