Got to Baker City and checked into a Best Western Motel! Thermostat is set on 60 degrees and I am standing in front of it. Feels sooooo nice. When I get good and cool I am going to sit in the hot tub! They have a rec room with a stationary bike, I can ride on that! (Just joking 🙂 )

this is our 6th full day of pedaling and we have come 320 miles so we are averaging about 53 miles per day. That average needs to come up to 70 per day but it will be easier to do when we get past the hills and I get in shape.

i am going to sleep in to 10 am in the morning and really work at getting fully rested as we resume our trip on Tuesday morning. Weighed and I have lost 6 lbs so far even with all the eating we have been doing. That is 1 lb per day. If I keep that up I will lose 60 lbs on the trip. You all won’t recognize me!

My brother, Cliff and John and I are all very hard of hearing and our conversations are about 50% “what?”. Takes awhile for the three of us to figure out anything. John’s wife, Mary Anne joined us today and as we sat  at “Subway” eating lunch she was our interperter. Thanks for praying for us. I actually think today that I might finish this adventure. Love ya all

We left Mitchel this morning at 6 am and I pushed my bicycle for 6 miles up mostly 6 % grade. John pedaled his the whole way up, he is an animal! At mile 58 John took off ahead of us getting tired of waiting as we rested every mile. We are staying in John Day tonight at Brandon and Melaney Smith’s place, John’s son and daughter in law. Well, when John got to there place he and Brandon came back and picked up Cliff and I in Brandon’s pickupI. I didn’t complete the entire route today, but I was so tired and sore I really didn’t care. I will make a visit next year and bike the part I rode in a pickup in. Brandon barbecued chicken for us and then we walked down to Dairy Queen and had blizzards for dessert. Tomorrow the destination is Baker City and we are going to stay in a motel and take a rest day. Sleep all day on Monday  except when I am sitting in the Hot Tub. Patty was going to come spend the day with me but she got very sick and won’t be coming over. That reduced the motivation to pedal hard tomorrow! Love ya all

My biggest problem right now is the pain in my backside. Today I needed to stop every two miles to recover. I have a large tube of “Butt Butter” which is supposed to help. I put it on often. I will get used to it soon I am sure but in the mean time it seems like torture that I am putting myself through. We biked 41 miles today and  are staying at the Mitchel City Park. Tomorrow we are going to John Day and will ride 68 miles. We start right right off going up about 2000 ft in 6 miles over Keys Creek pass, then the rest of the day will be relatively easy except for the heat. It was 98 degrees in Mitchel today.

Left camp this morning at 6:30 am and pulled into Ochaco Resevor camp sight at 5:30 pm. 11 hours on the road and it was in the mid 90’s from 11 am on. Cooked my brains out. Road 65 miles. We were in the saddle for 7 hours of that. We stopped in Sisters and had a big Coke and rested, stopped at Redmond at McDonalds and had Chicken McNuggets and another big coke with lots of ice. Stopped again in Prineville at Dairy Queen and had a large chocolate Sunday with peanuts and another big Coke with lots of ice! Not sure I would have survived without those stops, but one of my goals is to lose 32 lbs. if I keep this up I will come back 32 lbs heavier! We had planned on riding 70 miles tomorrow, but have decided to change that to 40 miles in that there are some steep hill climbing. Enjoying myself in camp each night reading and studying and writing. iPads are wonderful. Love ya all

Bicycled 30 miles today but it took us 7 hours. You do the math, not very fast. It was 90 % uphill some very steep. I had it in the lowest gear on my bike most of the day grinding out 4 to 6 mph. Made it to Lost Lake campground 4 miles before the summit of Hoodoo. Enjoying a nice dinner of  freeze dried ” chicken fajita”. Tomorrow we start the day with 4 miles of super steep and then 60 miles of mostly downhill and flat. I think it is going to be an easier day. Well I think I will find a shady spot and read my Bible and pray for you all. Love ya

Started at 6 am from our house this morning. At 2 pm we were sitting in a campground at Idanha trying to recover from a super difficult day of bicycling. It was super difficult because I am super out of shape, but after the end of the first week I should be as fit as Tim Tebow! It was super difficult because there were lots of long, steep hills that made me pant like a dog and sweat like a horse. I walked several times. As soon as my pedaling is slower than 3 mph I walk. It feels so good to use different muscles and to give my rear end a break. 53 miles today and only 32 tomorrow but tomorrow is almost all uphill. We will camp at Lost Lake. We stopped and rested a lot today, just about every 5 miles for a total of 2 hours. I would probably be dead if we hadn’t!

My goal was to be in bed by 9 pm and start the trip well rested, but here I sit in my recliner at 11 pm going over all my maps one more time and trying to think of anything I have forgotten. I am also entertaining a few creative thoughts on how I can opt out of this adventure without looking like a wimp! Oh well, here we go ready or not!

60 lbs packed in those 4 pretty yellow bags. Tent, sleeping bag, little cook stove, food for one week. Patty will mail food to locations on route each week. French press ( the most important thing) camp cloths, iPad full of books, camera, etc.  I am really nervous right now. Hopefully this time tomorrow I will be relaxing in our first camp feeling very confident.

Tuesday I, and a friend John Smith are leaving on a 3,700 mile bicyle trip to Portland, Maine. It will take 2 months and we will average 70 miles each day. We will camp each night and will carry everything we need on our bikes. We don’t have a support vehicle, but no problem because we have cell coverage the entire trip except for about 50 miles and I have a rider on my AAA coverage that covers bicycles.

One day to get everything needed for the trip packed into my panniers or saddle bags. I have two in the front and two in the back. The front two will weight 10 lbs. each and the back ones will weigh 15 lbs each and there will be an additional 10 lbs. with my tent on the top of the back bags and the stuff in my handle bar bag, so 60 lbs total. That slows me down about 3 miles an hour.

i will be writing a blog entry everyday about our adventures.