Last night sleeping at 4,000 feet the air temperature got lower, and overnight everything got covered in dew again. I woke up to a low mist hanging above Lost Lake.
The morning riding started off with a short ascent to Santiam Pass and then a 1,500 foot descent down to Sisters, the first town on the east side of the Cascades. From the east side Mount Washington stands tall and white, still covered in snow. It captures all the rainfall, enough to create glaciers which have carved it’s prominent pointy peak. It was visible in my rear view mirror the rest of the day.
As I travelled east the trees got smaller and less dense, and the arid landscape turned to golden grasses and sagebrush that I’m familiar with in California. I stayed at around 3,000 feet pretty much the whole day from here, travelling east first to Redmond, the largest of the towns, and finally through Prineville, which sits at the base of the Ochoco Mountains, which I will climb into tomorrow.
As I pulled into an overlook state park just before Prineville (which is a 300 foot descent from the road I’d been tracking across, sitting in a water carved valley) I met another cyclist doing the Trans America, the first person so far! They said I was also the first Trans America cyclist they had met, they left the same day as me but as a Portland local started just south of Tillamook. He was planning to go further than me tonight so we parted ways, but I suspect I’ll run into him again tomorrow or the day after maybe, he can’t be far ahead.
Tonight I’m staying at Ochoco Lake campground, really a reservoir rather than a lake, that sits just above Prineville. There are showers which will be nice after sweating across the hot roads today, I’m pretty sure I’m mildly sunburned on any exposed skin, which I tried to cover up, but not much you can do with your ears and face.
Tomorrow is going to be a scorcher too, the hotest day so far and climbing over desert mountains I’m planning to try and get the climbing done in the cooler morning hours. The route goes through John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, which looks interesting, if it’s not too much detour.