I’ve been riding for a week non stop now, I’m around 475 miles from Astoria along the trail.

The weather forecast today was for highs around 36°C (that’s about 97 for those who deal in freedom units; either way it’s hot), and unlike California the highs arrive later in the afternoon and stick around to the early evening. I wanted to get the two climbs to the passes done in the cooler morning temperatures so I got up at the crack of dawn at 4:20 and set off just as the first rays of sun were touching the top of the mountains at 5:30.

Leaving early was definitely the right call, the morning riding was so pleasant. Just before the first pass I ran into Dominic who I met yesterday and spent the rest of the morning cycling together, first with a glorious descent down from Ochoco Pass, which was so pretty, and then with a slog of a climb up Keyes Creek Pass, it was heating up and there was no shade.

From the second pass much of the afternoon was a meandering gentle downhill through increasingly dry landscape which was really beautiful, the plateaus from successive lava flows caused steps into the hills with table top mountains and crumbling basalt sandwiched between them.

The descent ended in the Sheep Unit of the John Day Fossil Beds National Monument. There were really pretty rock formations here, I would have stopped to do one of the hikes but it was so hot and standing in the sun was much hotter than moving on the bike, so in the end I just stopped for lunch before continuing on.

The rest of the day followed the John Day River upstream. I decided to just push on after stopping for a very satisfying ice cream sandwich in Dayville, spinning the pedals through the heat wasn’t really any worse than sitting out in it, and this way I’m closer to the climbs tomorrow, which I can hopefully do in cooler morning temperatures, although the forecast is for cooler weather tomorrow anyhow.

Todays ride took me through really varied landscapes, the first climb from Ochoco Lake to the pass was through fairly thick forest, and as the day went on the trees got smaller and really sparse, replaced by sagebrush. The east side of the Ochoco Mountains was beautiful landscape that was fun to ride a bike through, and the final ride up John Day River the terrain flattened out some more, the mountains turned rounder, with irrigated farmland stretching from the road to the mountains. As I cycled past the cows looked at me suspiciously, the horses pensively, and the goats curiously. The dogs always bark like hell.

Tonight a campsite with a shower again, very welcome after today’s heat, sitting along the banks of the John Day River. Looking forward to an early night tonight.