Day 11
Left Colville feeling well rested and rarin to go. The weather channel was calling for temps in the hunerts so we wanted to get to the mountains ASAP. Stopped at Roosevelt Lake and shot this pic
While we were stopped I noticed the accumulation of bugs from the previous days riding
There was a scenic overlook about 50 miles on down the road that called to us, so we stopped there as well. Took a few pics and gave the horse flys someone to play with (I killed about 38 at last count while hangin):
And a pic of Steve
About 8 miles west of Liberty, WA Steve got a rear flat tire. Luckily it didn’t let go all at once and he was able to pull over without incident. Unfortunately I didn’t notice till I was about 10 miles west of Liberty. So after turning around and coming to save the day, I rode back into Liberty, and got someone to help. That would be Randy and Junior.
Randy,
and his son Junior,
brought a tire plug patch kit and a tank of compressed air. Within 15 minutes he had the tire fixed and ready to go. Many thanks to both of them. After all was said and done, this set us back about an hour and a half. We stopped in the next 2 or 3 towns trying to find a new tire – in vain. The only thing we managed to do was delay ourselves another couple of hours so we were traveling through 104 temps in the heat of the day. It was brutal. (It would make me smile to see the folks that decided you had to wear a helmet in Washington have to ride through that heat in a full face helmet. What could they have been thinking. I don’t think they were. Safety my ass.)
When we finally made it to the Cascades, we were treated with tremendous views and a 20 degree drop in temperature.
It was nice to just sit and enjoy the coolness
There were mountains everywhere around us (notice the mirror)
The sun was beginning to set as we got to the western edge of the park. We stopped again at the Diablo Lake overlook for another couple of shots and to scare the other tourists.
We arrived in Everett, WA at Steve’s in laws about 9:30. They had a nice steak dinner awaiting us.
The days statistics – Left Colville, Wa about 10 am and arrived in Everett, Wa about 9:30 and traveled 341 miles for the day and 3703 for the trip.
We leave you with a couple of panoramas of the Cascades as the day was waning.
Tomorrow Steve plans to go into Everett and get a new tire as traveling on a plugged tire is not the safest or smartest move. We will probably have a day without any traveling.