Jack Johnson In The Gorge Amphitheater

So, Wendi and I drove five plus hours (dropping the kids off with friends in Portland) to central Washington to see Jack Johnson play in The Gorge Amphitheater in George Wa. Wendi has been a fan of his for awhile and I have been recently exposed to his music. It was a great concert. He played for two hours often bringing parts of the opening acts back on stage.

Wendi and I were wondering if maybe we have "outgrown" the concert scene though because there were lots of twenty-somethings doing lots of imbibing and acting a lot younger than their age, which was on some levels very entertaining. (Remind us to tell you the story of the young couple just down the hill from us!) Actually, the worst of it was a tie between the guy behind us using disparaging language to describe my beloved Beavers (I was wearing my OSU hat) and the group of girls sitting behind us while we were standing, throwing small foil balls in our direction in an effort to get us to sit down.

All in all it was a fantastic trip. One we would like to get on the schedule again for next year. We had a great time together. It was good for us and good for the soul to get away like that once in a while.

Family Reunion July 25th-27th

The Gale-Sedlacek-Westerberg family reunion was held this year in Cascade Locks Oregon. We usually have lots of food and fun and this year was no exception. We try to look for places with a pool and the KOA in Cascade Locks met the bill. In researching campgrounds, we knew that the Union-Pacific railroad has a mainline that travels the Gorge and comes quite close to the camp. We were told that "after a few trains go by we wouldn't even notice it". Well, we noticed it. And noticed it. And continued to notice it, all day, and all of the night.

All the kids (big and small) played so hard both in the pool and in the campground. At night we had campfires and got a game of Catchphrase started. During the day, the Gale family went on a hike to search out more geocaches and to exercise the dogs as well as the humans. We also spend some time at the fish hatchery, where we met Herman The Sturgeon. Herman was longer than both Casey and Alex laid end to end.

We have pictures but alas, I don't have them on this computer right now. We'll publish some of them as soon as we get them.

Day 6 Saturday June 28th

This is the last day of the ride. We started fairly strong and finished even stronger. Another day with a tail wind! This first picture is of the south end of Willapa Bay. The next picture is of Astoria with Saddle Mountain shrouded in the background with smoke. The third picture is of the Colombia River where I stopped to fix my first flat of the season. The last series of pictures are in Astoria enjoying a cool glass of sparkling apple cider and a celebratory bike lift. All total, 6 days and 323 miles. Up next, I think we are riding part of the Gorge.

Day 3 Wednesday June 25th Part 2

While the big boys rode down the coast, Wendi and the boys went with some friends further south and stayed a couple of night at the beach in some yurts. As you can see from these pics, they had a fantastic time both climbing around in the trees and at the beach getting very wet and sandy. Lastly, a nice warm campfire warmed and dried everyone. Of course the smores were a nice addition.

Day 3 Wednesday June 25th Part 1

Today we went from Bogachiel State Park to Quinault Lake, a total of 65.4 miles. Lots of this ride took place next to the beach though the last third went back inland. This first picture is of a bald eagle on a rock. We saw plenty of these wonderful creatures throughout our week. The second picture is of my buddies looking for a photo op.

Day 2 Tuesday June 24th

Tuesday we rode from Port Angeles to Bogachiel State Park, a total of 70.6 miles; Our longest day with the tallest mountain. This first picture was taken as the sun rose and hit our tent about 5:50am or so. Our tent is so huge it has three separate wings on the inside. We could easily sleep three families in there. Of course it takes a village to put it up but we don't mind. It allows our dogs to have a wing all to themselves. The second picture is of our two dogs, Raini and Bear. They are both well behaved and a joy to have in camp. This third picture is of Lake Crescent. We rode around the south side of the lake. The road here was decent if not very wide. The last picture posted is of one of my riding buddies as he gets off the bike to push the caution button to start the flasher lights. The sign warns bicycle riders that large RVs and log trucks use this eleven mile stretch of rode characterized by blind corners and very narrow roads. After the lake there was a climb up to 1200 feet and what was supposed to be a 30 mile descent though the head wind took the sails out of that excitement pretty quick. Once we made it to Forks, it was pretty short work to make it to the state park.

Day 1 Monday June 23rd

Day 1 went from Port Townsend to Port Angeles for a total of about 46 miles. We got a late start as we spent considerable time at camp getting ready and once we finally arrived at Port Townsend we spent the better part of an hour looking for a Geo Cache. We did find it but we ended up with pretty scratched legs. The ride itself was great. We stayed on Highway 20 until it met up with Highway 101 going up and down several rather large "hills". The highway 101 part went fine as well though there was lots of traffic. We ended up in camp around 4:30 and had a fantastic dinner.

Bike Ride Start

This is me and a couple of buddies starting in Port Townsend Washington on our way, via bike, to Astoria Oregon in six days. Our families did the ride support so we didn't have to carry gear with us.