As discussed the last few days, we drove down to Seaquest State Park near Mt. St. Helens yesterday to camp before my first bike road race of the year. Honestly, probably one of only two races of the year.

I rode the Tour de Blast which went from Toutle up the Spirit Lake Memorial Highway to Johnson Ridge Observatory - right near Mt. St. Helen's crater and 4000 plus feet above the starting line. And then we rode back.

This was one tough ride.

We did just under 7000 vertical feet of climbing over 84 miles. It was perfect cycling weather (for once in Washington this year) around a balmy slightly overcast 68 degrees. What has been called "Juneuary" due to poor weather disappointed us for once, and I relished the warmer summer weather.

We did the whole route in about 6 hours on the bike - the pace was certainly faster than I would have done on my own owing to some great riding partners.

There were a few times I was feeling the hurt - the profile for the ride looks roughly like this. Guess where the hurt was?

Here is a picture of me at the top of the first peak - taken by a guy I rode 1/2 the first incline with (and yes, I wonder why he included so much sky, but not my feet).

Here is a panorama I shot at Johnson Ridge Observatory. This is made from 3 16:9 widescreen Raw files from my Panasonic LX-2. That is one big pano!

Tags:Adventure