{"id":95,"date":"2007-09-15T09:56:53","date_gmt":"2007-09-15T15:56:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/?p=95"},"modified":"2008-02-09T15:15:55","modified_gmt":"2008-02-09T21:15:55","slug":"tour-day-29-prineville-or-to-warm-springs-or","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/blog\/2007\/09\/15\/tour-day-29-prineville-or-to-warm-springs-or\/","title":{"rendered":"Tour Day 29: Prineville, OR to Warm Springs, OR"},"content":{"rendered":"

75.74 mi \/ 4:57:20 time \/ 15.2 mph avg. \/ 32.0 mph max. \/ 1113 ft. climbing<\/strong>
\nStaying at Mecca Flat BLM Campground<\/p>\n

\"Largest<\/a>Today would be an easy day, so I started slow in the morning, reading the copy of Outside magazine that was given to me by a fellow traveler in Stanley, and then doing a short hike through the pines. There had actually been a tiny bit of drizzle in the night, which sent me scrambling out of the tent to cover my bike seat and grab my shoes, but it stopped before anything actually got wet.<\/p>\n

The ride started with some LSD (Long Steady Downhill), which got me quickly into Prineville (pop. 9990, big city!) Did library’n’lunch there, where I suddenly discovered a campground just off US 26 near Warm Springs. I had been planning on a state park a good way off US 26 that would have given me a 60 mile day, but I quickly scrapped that and went for a somewhat longer day in trade for less mileage over two days.<\/p>\n

\"Mt.<\/a>Halfway between Prineville and Madras, as I came over a hill, I saw a small mountain and thought, “hmm, that mountain has that low, wide, volcanic slope to it, almost like Mt. Hood. I must be getting close to those Cascades.” Then I looked a little to the left, and lurking behind it, a good eight times larger, “Holy shit, that’s<\/em> Mt. Hood!” It was difficult to see through the haze and distance, but seeing those bright glaciers shining through was quite an overwhelming feeling. I think I rode the next three miles with a huge goofy-ass grin on my face.<\/p>\n

Only thing is, it turns out that it wasn’t Mt. Hood. It was Mt. Jefferson. D’oh! I discovered that fact as I passed to the north of it without ending up in the Columbia River. Well they look pretty darn similar, how am I supposed to know? It’ll be interesting to see if I feel the same way when I see the real<\/em> Mt. Hood tomorrow.<\/p>\n

\"Mecca<\/a>Madras is big enough for a Safeway, so I did my final good grocery stock-up, including a big sub and a beer that I would take to camp for dinner. The last five miles of the day (except for the two miles of gravel to camp) were down into the deep Deschutes River gorge, sending me to less than 1500 feet! I’ve shrunken down to 5-foot-8 here because the tremendous air pressure is squeezing me down! So I spent last night at the very top of a mountain, and tonight at the very bottom of one.<\/p>\n

The campground is also the complete opposite of last night’s: a field of burning dust being blown around by a hellish wind, and right next door is some kind of private party house with lots of barking dogs, so we’ll see how the night goes!<\/p>\n

\"Day<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

75.74 mi \/ 4:57:20 time \/ 15.2 mph avg. \/ 32.0 mph max. \/ 1113 ft. climbing Staying at Mecca Flat BLM Campground Today would be an easy day, so I started slow in the morning, reading the copy of Outside magazine that was given to me by a fellow traveler in Stanley, and then […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-95","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bike"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=95"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gregie.com\/neil\/words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}