It was raining when I woke up this morning, to the cats escaping from the bathroom, neither of which was a surprise. Caitlin and I went out for bagels (drove) and she treated me once again, to a cheese and egg bagel at Breugger's, which was delicious. ...And yes, I'm going to talk about food in every post because biking 60+ miles a day makes me ravenous and puts it, along with where I'm sleeping, constantly on my mind. Deal with it. Her other out of town guests showed up at her apartment while we were there and we hurried back to greet them. One of them was from a circle of friends I hung out with a lot, but despite meeting many times before he claimed to have no recollection of me. What's funny is that I ran into him a couple years ago and he said the same thing then. ...I guess I'm fairly forgettable. I'm okay with that, it will make it easy if I want to take advantage of one time only offers, or as one friend pointed out, if I ever decide to become a serial killer.
I saw the break in the rain and headed out shortly after they arrived. ...It wasn't quite the window I hoped for. As I said, I got rained on with scant, brief exception all day long. And sadly, aside for that, not much happened all day either. After leaving Caitlin's I didn't talk to another human in person, barely saw any, for the rest of the day. I didn't see much but small towns and flooded fields. I didn't have any particular obstacles to overcome or interesting encounters of any kind, save where the shoulder ended for probably 7 or 8 miles between Tekamah and Decatur and I developed a kink in my neck watching my rearview mirror so much (thankfully traffic was very dead, a car every couple minutes generally). If this was a novel, today wouldn't get much page time, just a bit of narration explaining, "he biked in the rain, all day. By the end he was quite wet and rather miserable," then go on to the next day. I go back and forth on whether or not I'm glad life forces you to live all of it and not skip the dull, unpleasant bits.
What I am definitely glad about is that the Olympic Peninsula did teach me something. I won't claim I'm not still an idiot tourist, but I'm at least gradually becoming a more experienced one. My booties, waterproof gloves (ahem, water-resistant), and rain jacket (yep, no rain pants still because I'm still a damn fool) kept me dry enough not to freeze today, and that's better than I've done in the past. I can't emphasize enough, an hour in the rain is easy, but things change when it becomes six. My hands were so numb after the last 15 miles without any stops that I had to rediscover sensation to use my brakes when I stopped.
I reached the campground in the mid-afternoon with it still actively raining, discovered a shelter, saw a lack of good trees, and quickly decided that I did not want to set up my tarp and hammock in the rain, and that official policies be damned (there's a sign saying the shelter closes at 10pm, I'm sleeping on the picnic table in it, because I'm done with the rain. The campground is all but deserted, so who am I possibly hurting? I asked people to convince me to change my mind, prefacing it would be a hard sell, and no one tried. I'm in my bag, with my pad inflated beneath me, and surprisingly comfortable on this stone slab. I really hope I don't have anyone tell me to leave for no good reason. I just want to sleep and get moving in the morning...or whenever it stops raining, since it's supposed to. I've had my fill of rain for now.
Update: Now with pictures! ...Of mostly nothing!
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