I think I like this...

Today I'm sitting in a brightly lit, airy library in the small town of Burns Oregon. The previous 140 odd miles were pretty much void of all human life. It was really impressive how much open space there was. We spent the better part of yesterday in Lakeview and then road out in the afternoon for a solid 50 miles. We came sprinting out of a mountain pass into a huge valley surrounded by bare mountains, nothing but road and high desert for miles and miles, the sun was setting quickly behind the mountains, but thankfully some wise Oregon Transportation official saw fit to put a rest area right where we needed camp so we spent the night in the valley behind some small trees. The stars are majestic out here. Again we were worried about running out of water so we asked the good people of Oregon traveling through the rest area for water, they gladly complied and supplied us with the next days water (the rest areas water fountains were not working).

Today we road 86 miles to Burns, it's a good sized town with a nice little park that we hope to make home for the night. Unfortunately there is no bike shop, and Andrew's wheel still could use replacing so we hope to find something in Ontario, OR. Physically we are both doing great, a lot of miles on a bike will get you in shape pretty fast =)

The traffic along 395 between Lakeview and Riley is very sparse, but it has been interesting to note that with only one exception the only people to wave hello are people on motorcycles or guys in trucks, the one exception is a very flamboyant lady in an antique car. I've come up with all sorts of social theories as to why this is, but Andrew thinks they are pretty much ridiculous. Basically my theory revolves around the fact that guys in pickup trucks are more prone to expressing themselves and thus freer with their emotions. I could expand but I'll leave it at that.

Highlight for the day for me was riding alongside stampeding cattle, I felt like a cowboy for about a minute, and then the road turned away and my herd was no longer with me. Andrew's highlight was getting to the Riley gas station after 90 plus miles of pretty disolate desert.

This first picture of one of the areas we went through. The second picture is off a big honkin lake with no people = lots of real estate potential!!! and the third and final picture is my favorite for the day. We rode through this town called Wagonwheel, the gas station was all boarded up, and I'm pretty sure population was approaching zero, but they did have shade and a skull at the entrance of the motel which just made me laugh.

Hope you're enjoying reading these posts, we're enjoying the ride. We are steadily getting the hang of this touring thing, the key is to talk to the locals, and not to look at your watch =)

From out west,
Nate

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