Hell Yeah Boy! Lewiston (Idaho) to Walla Walla (Washington)

The scene: Best Western in Walla Walla, Washington. Predator is on the TV, Bert is in bed, a demolished pizza delivery is in view. Bert is becoming more and more like Superhans from Peep Show, with almost everything being declared 'bullshit'. Genuine quote from today in a gas station: "These ice creams are BULLSHIT!" Our night in Lochsa Lodge has given us some new catchphrases but I can't put them here, we are trying to get rid of them before getting in serious trouble from using them in public.

I've said before that each day's journey is like a dream and looking at today's photos really brings that home, seeing the ones from the ride out of Lewiston this morning feels like an awful long time. I find that I can't judge how far back things are once I've ridden past them, they are in the dream world immediately.

We crossed the Snake River into Washington whilst leaving Lewiston, the river that Lewis and Clark followed to the Columbia then the Pacific. We've been following their tracks for hundreds of miles now and are getting a bit L&C'd out as their name is on almost every coffee shop, garage, side road and barber shop. Every tourist sign and historic marker is about them. This is great, but we are starting to lose the sense of wonder a little.




I have a bad cough at the moment, I sound like a dying sea lion, wheezing and barking and producing green lumps at inopportune moments. I was really struggling this morning, our plan was to do 100 miles to Walla Walla including 2 or 3 decent climbs and I really didn't feel up to it. We rode along the snake for a little while, past incredible rock cliffs similar to the Giants Causeway before hitting the climb.




As usual Bert tore off as soon as we hit the hill, I struggled up the 10 mile decent climb, harder than anything we hit in the rockies. At the top I'm expecting a little pass and a descent, but I'm totally shocked to be back on the plains! There is no sign whatsoever of where we came from, just plains as far as you can see in all directions. It's like a secret world that we've accidentally found the entrance to and is an extremely strange feeling. No wonder it all seems like a dream.




Ridewise Bert likes to dash and chill, I'm more of a constant trundler. The usual deal on long hills is that I'll work my way up slowly whilst bert will get stuck in with red eyes, and we'll meet at the top. My wheezing state amplifies this difference, giving bert a good 15 or 20 minutes free time at the top which he makes the most of by lazing on the grass in the sun admiring the lush green plains stretching all around.

It's a bit of a decision point. I'm feeling rough as hell, running at about 60 percent of normal, accommodation is either in 10 miles or 60 miles with nothing at all in-between. I'm used to pushing on so figure I'll go for it, we can always camp, that's what the tent is for.

Amazingly the next 30 miles are downhill with a tailwind, without pedaling we cruise along at 20mph, this is what it’s all about. Realising it’s Sunday, when almost everything is shut in these small towns (I keep expecting a sign saying ‘town closed, please go around’), we get a cheese toastie and our water bottles refilled at a diner. Most tasty.

The gentle downhill takes us through amazing valleys, past weird rock formations, along valley floors and meadows, strange junkyards in the middle of nowhere, abandoned barns and homes, fields of llamas, goats, donkeys, running deer, grassland waving in the breeze, a dust-devil forming, smooth empty road, wide shoulder. More dreamtime.

Riding through a cool little town (Dayton) a group of skateboarders is chilling on the main street. I like skateboarders, they feel kinda like wheeled cousins. In the pantheon of wheeled creatures bikes and skateboarders get on pretty well, we are much closer than motorbikes who seem to look down on us somewhat, although over here we do get the nod and wave from plenty of them, something I’ve never had in the UK.

One of the 10 year old skate kids is mounted on rollerblades and he breaks away from his buddies, racing me along the pavement. This is plenty cool, I love little episodes like this. As we race along the mainstreet, him dodging pedestrians, me dodging cars, we are grinning at each other, and both end up laughing out loud with sheer fun.

Time for another climb, I’m dreading this one as am still not feeling right. After a formal goodbye Bert heads off up the slope. I’ve been trying to teach him to ride slowly but he keeps failing the course by sprinting when he thinks I’m not looking.

Strangely my legs kick back in about half way up the hill, which is a few miles long, and I manage to stay only a few hundred metres behind bert. He doesn’t realise this, secure in the knowledge that the usually reliable kelv is not firing on all cylinders. As I reach the top I see him in the rest area taking off his helmet and dusting off the ground with his little hanky ready for a nice long snooze until I make the top.

But my legs are running well and as the gradient flattens I stand on the pedals, maximum acceleration, feeling the strong smooth power of the now fully functional main engines that I’ve had to nurse along all day. I take a wide curve through the rest area to stay out of his sight, using a passing truck to mask the sound of my tyres at about 25mph I pass an inch from his sleepy feet, shouting at the top of my voice “HELL YEAH BOY!” I’m rewarded with a startled squawk and look back to see his gangly arms and legs waving helplessly like a beetle on its back as he stares wildly around in panic.

This is enough to have me giggling spontaneously for the rest of the day and I enjoy the following descent to the next town. This is supposed to have a short gentle climb out of it, but the map makers have screwed up and it’s the 3rd decent climb of the day with loads of false summits. At the top we see a thunderstorm gathering with lightening playing about. We know we have about 12 miles to Walla Walla and it’s mostly downhill so we race the storm, staying just ahead of it and surfing the wind. We maintain a good 20mph into town, both enjoying the feeling of being able to pound along strongly after over 90 miles.




I still got the cough though.