Pink Trout on Wheels

For those of you who have continued to check in on Wayward Princess, despite the relative lack of excitement following India, I have again embarked upon adventures. Not quite as exotic as India, but adventurous never-the-less.

Wednesday morning I found myself in a rental car heading North to green Oregon for a few weeks of visiting family, visiting the cabin and bicycling my brains out.

Today was quite lovely. We (self, father figure, and step-mother figure) depart for the cabin in Central Oregon tomorrow so spent today up in the Columbia Gorge doing a 40ish mile training ride between Hood River and the Dalles (for those of you familiar with these parts.) Lovely mountains, trees, water, and so on - with a sizable dash of wind thrown in for aggrivation - made for a great ride. For the most part we were on an old highway that is generally not used, which was a nice change from the heavily trafficked roads I've been riding (all alone) recently.

Following that we had a bit to eat and then headed back to Portland to visit the bike shop, the fruit stand and REI (an outdoorsy store that is having a mamouth sale.) I have to say that I feel victorious, triumphant and terribly successful when I consider all these stops.

Lucy (bicicletta mia) had a massive tune-up right before I left but something still wasn't quite right with the front derailer. Super-nice Patty connected me with super-nice Tom who fixed Lucy up just about as good as a 20+ year-old bike like her is gonna get. And mind you, we walked into the store on a busy busy Saturday evening and they fixed up right then and there despite piles of other bikes already on the racks. And THEN, the ultra-highlight, Tom helped me instal streamers in the handlebars. Oh yeah! They didn't have pink, but they did have white which goes with Lucy's paint-job quite well. I am currently searching for a good receipe for blueberry cookies with which to give Tom as a token of my appreciation. He's also done some wonders with adjustments to Marsha's (previously noted step-mother unit) breaks.

The fruit stand had alllll sorts of lovely fruits and vegetables and they helped us pick out all sorts of lovely things to take with us to central oregon that would also last us through the week. This was also a deal where we arrived minutes before closing.

The most impressive feats of the day occured at REI. I had been feeling almost sick because of all the gear stuff I need to get in preperation for Cycle Oregon. Cycling shoes, new pedals for said shoes (so I can clip in and pedal much more efficiently), a larger duffle bag, long biking pants, several pairs of biking socks, a flashlight, ear warmer/headband thingy (for 30 degree mornings) a camping towl (that folds up real small and dries out real quick) and so on. This all could easily come up to $400-$500 as biking stuff is so friggin' expensive. Easily $400 - $500. However, thanks to the fabulous sale, I procured just about everything (minus the pedals) for the bargain rate of $190. And this includes a pair of undies I bought that were rather frivolous, what with being rather unnecessary (though a bit of a luxury) and costing $22. So really I got all the stuff I needed for just about $170. Most impressive, I believe, were the shoes that are normally more than $120 and which I got for $37 and the socks that normally go at around $15-$20 that I picked up for $1.92. Much of my success is due to having small feetsies (and other parts) and so those sizes being the ones left after the more normal sized people come through.

So yes, the Pink Trout on Wheels (my name for Cycle Oregon - think Brooke Trout, then my recent affinity for pink and the fact that I shall be on wheels) was very successful.