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McKenzie Pass Ride + false-start

May 25, 2020 (Morning)

Exercise Type: Bike

Weather: quicky warmed to 70 low (but high 40s/cloudy, high up)

Comments:
Up early up at Three Creeks. AM birds were SOOO LOUD!

Made coffee, then drove down the hill on a gorgeous AM. Drove slowly, since the views of the Three Sisters were outstanding!

Ankle was shitty this AM -- clearly it didn't like all the hiking/skiing. But...it was worth it (I guess!)

Drove into Sisters for the ride up McKenzie Pass. I last (/first) did this with Dan in early 6/2009, when he helped move me here. CA and I parked at the same coffee shop off the main drag.

As we were prepping to take off, catastrophe: I stripped the screw of my bike seat! Shit! I constantly have to put it up and down to store in the van.

Welp, I stripped it. But thankfully the hardware store was open, so they found and sold me a scre and a nut to fit the bracket.

However, I wasn't out of the woods yet: I was told the screw would hold without the nut, so I didn't tighten it...

...so when we took off westbound down 242, I made it nearly 4 miles before my seat came loose! And since I didn't have a wrench, we had to bike BACk to the van. There I found a vice grips to get that nut all the way on and (barring one scare) it stayed tight.

Rode moderate effort up the climb. Weather was nice on the east side but once we got within about 5mi of the pass, it clouded up and got chilly. And WINDY. Rode uphill into a headwind the final few miles.

Cool to hang out up there, but we kept it short...then bombed back down!

Fun ride. TONS of people were doing it that day - one of the last "closed to cars" days of the spring.

Rest of the day:
* drove back to Eugene
* unpacked
* I treated 2 patients
* home

TIRED! Big weekend!