A bit more about my Sunday Adventure

I was pretty tired on Sunday night when I got home, so here's a bit more of a ride report.

First thing, I took off around 9am, slabbing down 405 to 167 to 18 in order to get to the track. I was meeting a guy there to give him something I needed cut to make taking my front wheel off easier. So, I ran down and met Norm there. I ran into Tim while I was there, bullshitted with Norm and Tim until Tim's session started, watched 5 minutes of the session and took off.

18 to I5 to Tacoma, and in Tacoma, I took 7 south toward Rainier. Up until now, I had been on 100% slab. Hwy 7 is a long straight slab, followed by some decent turns as it heads into the mountains. So, of course, because there are some decent turns, I got stuck behind traffic. Lots of traffic. The worst part was that every time I saw open road in front of the cars I was in, I couldn't pass, and by the time I could pass, there was another 5 cars in front of the people in front of me. Frustrating to say the least.

At one point, I had a decent run at a turn while a guy on a big cruiser was following me. Halfway through the turn, I swore I heard him crash. Being mid-turn, I didn't want to turn around and look, so as soon as I straightened up, I looked back, to see him "deep" into the corner, dragging his floorboards through the corner. I gave him a "rock on" sign and a thumbs up to and kept on rolling.

The traffic in Elbe was pretty bad, and since it's a gas station, and the last one before the park, and it's also a couple little places to eat, it was busy. Really busy. I kept rolling. I headed from Elbe, out on 706 until I got to the entrance to the park. I stopped for something to eat and drink at the little store, and for cash for the park entrance, didn't even consider there might be an entrance fee. Debit/credit minimum of $7, wtf am I going to spend $7 on to get some gatorade and a candy bar? Oh, a shot glass! Then, they didn't have an ATM, or give cash back, but the guy at the store said they took cards. Sweet, no worries. Onward. $5 for bicycle/pedestrians, $15 for cars. Motorcycles: $5 WHOO HOO!

10 minute wait to get into the park due to the line, which means traffic all through the park. But, it was worth it. The park was beautiful. The road for the first half of the park was completely broken up, and you had to be alert just to keep from being tossed off the bike, but once that cleared up, it was a nice ride. Awesome corners in the park, but, I was stuck behind people going below the posted speeds, so, it was all scenic, not much good riding. The views made up for it.

I stopped at a waterfall to use the bathroom, and it was closed. The waterfall was awesome though, and worth the stop. I wasn't in a walking mood due to my racing boots, or I would have walked down to the bottom of it to see it from there.

I stopped a couple other places along the way to take some pics of my bike and the mountain. Nothing to note, but you can look at my myspace to see the pictures I took.

On my way back down the mountain, I found some good clear road, and got to kick it up around a couple corners before the road straightened back out. From 706, I took 123 and then 410 back up toward Enumclaw. These roads had some decent corners, but again, I was stuck behind traffic, so I enjoyed the scenery.

Then, about 20 miles from Enumclaw, I saw a guy pushing a Harley I stopped to see what I could do to help and it turns out that his barrel key had fallen out. Yes, his key fell out. It's a horizontally mounted, barrel key, and it's under the seat. It fell out and got ran over, which changed the shape, and it wouldn't go back in. I gave him my pliers from my toolkit and it didn't help at all. So, he tried to catch a ride into town with me, but I have no seat, no pegs--not happening. So, I offered to let him use my phone to call his friend to go get his extra key. Not home. So, I went to the next town and called him a tow truck. I hope he got home ok.

Right where I stopped to help the harley guy, there was a line up of cars due to a motorcycle wreck, traffic backed up for miles. I saw a tow truck go by with 2 sport bikes on it, one was upright, and looked beat to hell. The other was on it's side. That thing was done. Traffic cleared up not to long after that, and we all marched in line into Enumclaw, where I got lost, took about 5 wrong turns, but knew as long as I headed west and north, eventually, I'd get to something I knew (hey, you can only go so far west around here!) and then I'd be golden. All my wrong turns ended up ok, and I got on I5, and jammed home.

I made it home at 6pm.

It was well worth it. An entire day to yourself and your bike will do wonders for a person's soul.




Cliff's Notes:
Traffic made the twisties straight, but the scenery made that ok. Also, WHEEEEE!