Day 7 (54 miles)
Trip Start
Jun 13, 2008
1
8
36
Trip End
Aug 09, 2008
Colville,
Washington,
United States
Saturday, June 21, 2008
sherman pass
. a handful of raindrops fell on us, but the clouds seemed content with that and started to clear again.this day's ride was the first to have the mountain pass at the beginning of the day, and that completely change the pacing of the ride. to me, the fun part was over and the climax had been reached, so the rest of the ride should be easy and over with quickly. wrong! the next 40 miles wound along the columbia river, up and over rolling hills, and along a detour due to a road closure. to avoid the road closure, we got directions from a kid in town who had been trailing us for a while on his bmx bike. us "serious' bikers were feeling a little silly because he was keeping pace with us just fine despite the fact that he was only about 12 years old and not on a fancy-shmancy road bike like ours. although the last miles dragged on, there were some great views from the hilly vantage points, and later, as we began to approach colville, we were cycling through really nice meadowy/pasture areas. when we hit town, we discovered that our directions to the night's lodgings weren't quite right (what's beginning to become a running trend due to some slightly dodgy mapping software), but after conversing with some locals, we were able to find it okay.
colville was a strange little town
sherman pass
. it was a small town that had grown large enough to support a wal-mart and some fast food chains (including an arby's! i couldn't resist the roast beef sandwich and curly fries post-biking snack), but there was something bleak about the place that i couldn't quite place. possibly it was the clouds that were looming and building up again in the evening... either way, i wasn't sad that we would be leaving the next morning. after dinner, the thunderstorms finally hit. a couple of us were camped outside the local library poaching their wireless internet, and we had to run for cover under the city hall's eaves in order to finish our web surfing before calling it a night. shortly after we went to bed, the thundershowers petered out, so fortunately the weather was going to shape up for the next day, and our lucky weather streak would continue. 
