Five Days in Hiding (USA Days 111-115)
How do you cycle tour when you can’t cycle?
I’ve not been blogging because we’ve been hiding a little: hiding from Amy’s ankle tendonitis, hiding from the elements, hiding from the internet, hiding from other tourers lest they make us jealous. It’s like we’d been freewheeling for weeks, then accidentally slammed on the brakes. You know what happens next if you’re not strapped in, and bikes don’t got no straps.
It’s not all doom and gloom: some wonderful hosts have shown us real kindness in letting us stay, giving us lifts to or from towns, sharing meals with us, suggesting ankle remedies. In exchange we’ve baby-proofed a house, built a sofa, baked cookies and chopped veg. In lieu of cycling, we’re playing as domestic creatures, which was an unwelcome change of pace but we’ve done our best to acclimatise to it. It’s even beginning to be…fun?
Greg and Norma (and their good good dog, Rocket) gave us a lift to a national forest north of Coos Bay, where we loaded up our bikes for the first time in four days and cycled two miles to the beach. Through sea spray and high wind we watched the sun crash moodily towards the horizon. Pacific sunsets: a currency we thought we’d collect nightly. This was our first. Amy’s left thigh, the one doing all the work while her right leg recovered, cramped up as we descended the steps from the dune. She squeaked and rubbed and winced, and our evening of riding was over. In a gap between trees as the light died, we pitched our tent in the sand and ate handfuls of almonds and dark chocolate until we could see them no longer, then climbed inside to sleep.
The morning didn’t stay in the sky. It rained thunderously, the heaviest rain since Missouri but more insistent. We’d given ourselves a flat ten-mile ride into Coos Bay where we’d be picked up by Ed, our next host, to drive down the coast to Bandon. Amy felt solid enough to pedal and I was dying to stretch my shell-shocked legs, but by the time we reached Coos Bay’s imposing iron estuary bridge the wind and rain were so intense that we could only walk our bikes along the tiny elevated pavement, spitting and blinking and placing careful, plodding feet until the top, then gripping brakes on the way back down. Floundering black astride and blinding wet, my head repeated. Ted Hughes knew wind better than anybody. My glasses steamed and dripped like the lid of a pan, but I’d rather that than having the balls of my eyes dented by the brunt wind, or whatever. I can’t remember that line as well.
We climbed back on when the road widened and pedalled the final few miles to Coos Bay, with its cute coffee shop called ‘So It Goes’. Excited about the possible Vonnegut connotations, we poked inside and huddled over hot coffees, nudging at an ankle, wringing out a trouser. We grip our hearts and cannot entertain book, thought or each other. Yes, Ted, yes.
Breakfast was steaming veggie sausage and cream ‘gravy’ over cheese scones. Lunch: a mug of porridge-thick tomato soup layered thick with a lid of grated cheese and whole chives. The sun emerged when we did, and found Ed, post-dentist, with a car and a warm greeting. Within an hour we’d arrived at the lake house and met Suzy, who ushered us inside, her warm bluster immediately disarming. We’d offered to do chores and chores we did, grateful for the purpose. When they were done, the four of us ate frittata made with eggs from the chickens, played bird-themed card games, wandered down to the dock to listen for beavers (‘ker-THWACK!’), slept so deeply and woke to rain.
My rain-stopped phone spent the day in rice. Amy’s angry ankle spent the day in ice. I grew tired of asking Amy about her ankle. She grew tired of reporting on it. We foraged for huckleberries until our eyes were keen enough to spot a laden branch. There’s a knack to it: you lever down the branch until your hand can cup beneath it flat, then gently rub the branch until the tiny berries tumble into your palm. Once it’s full, you release the branch and sort through what you’ve got, flicking away the green ones, pinching off the stalks of the good, black-blue ones. Around our necks swung plastic tubs on scratchy string that slowly filled, and I mean slowly, but that’s the joy. By lunch, we had thousands. Enough for a batch of scones. Later, Suzy took me around the forest paths to hunt Chanterelle mushrooms, grubbing through the dirt for their distinctive pale orange trumpets until we’d filled two paper bags. You cut through the base to encourage re-growth, then cover them with dirt and move on. It’s like an Easter egg hunt if the bunny was vegan.
Amy had a gentle swim to soothe the ankle. I tried stand-up paddle-boarding on the lake and learned to effectively turn left. Right, I’m still working on. Come to me for any left-turning needs, though. I’m an expert. There was no way Amy was going to risk her ankle on a board, so we compromised and went on the kayaks, gliding through the water amongst patches of lilies, watching for the gentle V waves made by a beaver’s nodding head.
Our final breakfast of huckleberry scones, scrambled eggs and foraged mushrooms was a celebration of our domestic days. I’ve never spent more time on a meal or had such a proportion of it come from the surrounding wilderness. Food that can only come when you stop moving. Food to be proud of. Food to fuel a day of cycling? We’ll see.
