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With all the preamble finally out of the way, I left Ashland this morning at 7 and wow was it fucking cold.  I had an idea when my train got to Klamath Falls that I would have to amend the clothing I packed.  At a really cool bikeshop in Ashland (in a house) and an outdoor store (a crunchier city you have never encountered) I grabbed some tights and ear warmers and was staring at some full-fingered gloves when I got sick of buying stuff and blew that off.  Big fucking mistake.  The first two hours were like frostbite– a lot of pain.  Almost immediately, I considered turning around and waiting for a shop to open, but I decided to just push on and wait for the sun.  That is one of the joys of touring solo– the decisions only impact you.  I wouldn’t be comfortable asking someone else to do that if they had forgotten equipment and I’d feel guilty as hell if I had to delay everything while I got my shit together.

Anyway, my first few days are not in the Touring the Pacific Coast book or on the standard Adventure Cycling Association (hereinafter “ACA”) maps.  It is a more inland route that I found on the website of a commercial cycle touring operation but it didn’t have maps so I am kind of winging it.  Being off the beaten path today was great.  Once I left Ashland (where morning bike commuters were flying past me and the loaded beast) I never saw another bike– just beautiful scenery.

My first stop was “historic Jacksonville,” which is apparently how it is always referred to.  Really cool old mini-town where I stopped for an awesome tofu scramble at an unexpected Jewish deli called MacLevins.  The owner was really cool, unprompted (I just asked for no cheese) she made sure my meal was vegan, brought me the paper and kept bringing hot coffee for my frozen hands.  After, I told her that I was sure that this would be the best breakfast of my trip, and I’m pretty sure it will be.

I’ve noticed that most of the tour journals I’ve read talk a lot about meals and it looks like mine won’t be much different.  When you are burning 6-8,000 cals a day, it becomes a focus.

With my hands thawed, I continued through more small towns.  Once the sun came out, things weren’t so bad, although  I was never able to take off my tights or fleece.  As the track shows, there wasn’t much climbing, mostly descents and flats, although I was into a headwind all day.  Good thing, the first few climbs on a fully loaded touring bike are a shock.  Things don’t react the way you are used to and for me at least, standing up made things a lot less stable.  More on that tomorrow, which promises bigger climbs.

The scenery was gorgeous.  Most of the day was along rivers and creeks in the bottom of a valley, which explains the flatness.  It mostly looked like this:

I highly recommend this route for anyone looking to do a little touring off the beaten path.  There wasn’t always a shoulder, and when there was, it wasn’t always that wide, but not too many scary truck encounters and people up here seem to respect bikes.  Ashland was insanely bike friendly.  I was about to write about how bikey San Luis Obispo was (very) but Ashland one-upped it.  Oregon has a law that requires cars stop for pedestrians waiting for a cross walk and drivers extend that to bikes as well.

Ashland in general was surreal.  I was there not only because it was a great place to start this tour, but because my sister and I wanted to pay respects to our parents there.  They loved coming up here for the Shakespeare festival that the town is known for.  Even if you don’t see a play, the place is unbelievably beautiful and people are ridiculously pleasant.  It reminded me a lot of Ithaca, where I was ostensibly educated in the law (it is home to Southern Oregon University,) except the students looked happy and weren’t noticeably from Long Island.

Just below the Elizabethan stage for the festival, I found a storybook looking public park with a pond and ducks.  I had it to myself.  On a green next to it, a guy was playing cello for a couple friends.  I felt like I was in the Truman Show or something, it couldn’t be real.

I scattered my mom and dad’s ashes there.  It was pretty emotional but I don’t write about stuff like this.  I’d rather be distant and smart ass.

So back to the trip.  Coming up on Amtrak was okay.  It is a long time to be sitting on the train, but a lot of it was overnight, so I slept.  I also read “Out Stealing Horses” by Per Petterson– kind of a Scandinavian Cormac McCarthy– they both write books about boys living on a border with horses in the title.  I liked it.

Taking a shuttle from Klamath Falls to Medford was definitely a good decision– the road was beautiful– it went by Crater Lake and Lake of the Woods but there were many elevation changes and it didn’t look bike safe.  I couldn’t use the front rack on the bus because I couldn’t clamp the front wheel due to my front rack, but the bus wasn’t crowded, so I brought it onboard.  The bus even had wifi and I was able to get the ticket from Amtrak.

I’ll keep posting updates when I can.  I’m pretty tired and a fire and some weird sweet potato noodles await.  This campground is pretty cool, wifi and the store had some fleecy gloves for $2.50 that I can use until I hit a bike store.  It may get close to freezing tonight, but for now, I’m happy.

Home sweet home, Wonder KOA