Day 69 Yakima to Snoqualmie

Day total 93
Trip total 3,619

Tomorrow is practically all down hill to Seattle so today was our last really challenging day of biking (although many times throughout this trip we have said "There is no such thing as an easy day." Yesterday being a perfect example only 47 miles but 4 flats). And what a day it was...

We woke in the home of a hop distributer whose front yard looks out on one of Washington's many vineyards and the Union Gap and then we climbed, all day, 90 plus miles, every single one of which was uphill against wind. The Iron Horse Bike Trail that we thought would make our ride smooth and easy was unpaved and coated with golf ball size pebbles. By dusk when we reached the 3 mile "service road" that was supposed to take us to the home of our warmshower host who lives near the Snoqualmie Pass every part of my body and even optimist spirit was spent (and cold and wet because by this time we are 3,000 feet up and it is raining).

This was the first time in our 3,000 plus mile journey that I could not ignore all the facts that so clearly pointed to the fact that we were going to die. We were on a washed out gravel road in the MIDDLE OF NOWHERE. Since no one with pure intentions would ever legitimately host cyclists from such a remote location. It only seemed logical that this was clearly all a plot to kill us.  Let me emphasizes that we were so removed from all of civilization that if we blew the bright orange REI rape whistles my mom gave us no one would have heard us. However, since we had previously mailed back our tent and sleeping bags and it was raining  and bound to be about 35 F at night our options were limited. And freezing is a slower and more painful death then a quick gun shot so we trudged on, pushing our bikes up this never ending gravel unrideable road into darkeness.

Finally in the distance we see a bouncing headlight. Todd, 6"7, is jumping up and down because he is so excited for us that we made it. He grabs my bike and proceeds to lead is up a couple more miles of gravel road while he excitedly tells us all the details of his bike tours through Bosnia, Russia and Slovakia. Nik, (who is still pushing his own bike) tells Todd that we will probably have to bum a ride tomorrow. Todd laughs and says he has never owned a car. He then leads us down another dirt path to his tiny house, 192 square feet to be exact, which he built himself on the couple acres of private land in the middle of national forest. It is powered by a hydro electric generator sourced by a local waterfall. We stashed our biked precariously around the outdoor composting toilet that sits conspicuously in the middle of his front deck. Inside his tiny (and incredibly warm) house Todd precedes to make us tea and dinner and talks to us about all his bike tours. He is now 45 and has done at least two a year since we first started touring at 20. He built his tiny house so he can live this way, with virtually no expenses ($500 property tax, $50 for his cell phone $200 for propane and a bit more for food) he can afford to bike and travel all the time. Nik and I went to sleep (in his bed, he slept outside in an all seasons sleeping bag because he prefers it), with our minds expanded and our lives a little bit richer because of the journey we had made that day, and trust we had put in a stranger that night.