Day 4 - Honeyman State Beach to Sunset Bay State Park (57 miles / 224 miles total)

There is no other way to put this so I will just say it, day 4 sucked:

• I had to walk across a long bridge not meant for walking but even worse for riding. The sidewalk was so narrow I don’t know how they can call it a sidewalk, but they did.
• The wind was the strongest, yet I was stuck riding perpendicular and/or walking my bike for too much of the day.
• It finally hit me that the Oregon Coast, is in fact, hilly. When I reach the top of a hill I think to myself, “you did it, you can relax.” But the hill simply responds with “you did, now here’s another hill” and I abide.
• Cars were out in force today. None were dangerous but there were so many of them you become numb to the Pacific that is guiding you along the route. Diesel fumes are a kick in the pants.

I thought I was going to have a good day but looking back on that now I wonder if my optimism was simply coffee induced. Who knows.

Let me talk about the hills for a moment. Most hills go unnoticed by those in a car. Some may even be missed entirely by a cyclist on a nice bike but let me say as clear as I can, no hill goes without disdain for a guy on a bike tour with as much weight as I have. Hills can lead to instant frustration when combine with a mileage marker that is off by mere 1/2 a mile (as is the case with Sunset Bay).

So what do you do when you’re in Oregon and you are having a bad day? You stop by Dairy Queen and scarf down a waffle cone chocolate strawberry in two minutes.

The guy working the register at Taco Bell he was having a long day.

What do you do with a bad day? I’m not sure. Without a head wind would a tail wind ever feel great? I expect that there will be more of these days to come. I have no intention of stopping but yesterday I would have rather been doing any number of things.

And, for the record, I’m sick of sand dunes.

But my day did get better. Sunset Bay is a nice campground with nice showers (I finally took a shower). The camp host let me stay in regular camp ground instead of the hiker/biker slots. I also met Michael who is heading in the same direction from Portland. He’s a nice guy on his first tour. He smokes, which cracks me up. He’s a little sick so I gave him my Dayquil that Christine was nice enough to pack in my suitcase of medical supplies. We also shared some rum before going to bed like the pirates that used to hide in Sunset Bay.

My handlebar bag is holding up pretty well – not perfect, but it doesn’t need to be.  I adjusted my seat and it feels better today. My pinky is no longer numb. All good things.

We had a number of correct answers to yesterday’s trivial questions:

Grandma Marge from Rockaway, OR and Marin, CA was the first to respond with Hazelnut

Kelly C. also had the right answer.

Tabasco (David K.) had a different, but correct answer, “Sellers”.

______ was the first lighthouse built in Oregon.

Cities passed:
Dunes City (pop. 1,241)
Gardiner (pop. 600)
Reedsport (pop. 4,378 – I would avoid stopping here as they don’t seem to like people on bikes)
Lakeside (pop. 1,371)
Hauser (pop. unknown)
North Bend (pop. 9,544)
Charleston (pop. 700)

Anyhow, I better go as I’m sitting under a no trespassing sign.

Sellers
[still no good internet so the picture quality is bad. I’m not sure if the labels uploaded correctly either]