Day 8: Frenchglen to Riley

Today's Mileage:79 miles
Total mileage for the trip: 600 miles

My alarm went off at around 6 am, and I hit snooze a few times before rolling out from under the nice comfy quilt on my bed at the Frenchglen Hotel. By the time I got downstairs, coffee was already on, and the manager was setting the table for breakfast. He seemed genuinely sad that I would not be joining them, but I was in a real hurry to get on the road. I did stay around long enough to chat with some folks from Eugene, an older couple who were artists, who had a lot of good ideas about what was important in life and so forth. I paid my tab and left, almost kicking myself for my visit. The inn is very quaint and homey, and the service excellent, but for my purposes I would have been better off going to a campground. It would have cost me a fifth of the price I paid.

Honestly, not much happened on the road today except for a lot of sweating on my behalf. The way was relatively flat, and I did stop off in Burns for a few things, some JB Weld to fix my broke eyelet, and another Blizzard from the DQ. In order to try to escape the heat of another day, however, I stopped in at the Bureau of Land Management to check on the status of some camping spots I might want to take advantage of. I was told that I could certainly camp off the trail behind the rest area outside of town.

I pedaled on, now that the heat of the day had finally broken. I finished the trip out to the rest area, walked the foot path behind it, set up the tent and watched the sun go down. Good riddance.