What an up and down day! It started with a downpour just as I was about to leave Sandpoint. So - I sat in my hotel room for an hour until the rain diminished to a drizzle. The weather has been totally nuts. It rained, then changed to partly sunny. Then it poured again, then sunshine, then gray. It ended on a sunny note. A couple of the cyclists I met coming in the other direction said that they were actually hailed on today. Ouch. I'm glad I missed that. Maybe today's weather should be described as partly rainy.
I only half followed the Adventure Cycling maps today. I headed out on US2 - the mapped route had me backtracking out of Sandpoint, plus it appeared to be longer. I did pick up one of the back roads though. It turned out to be a very nice road. I cut back to route 20 at Usk. I couldn't figure out where to stay - Usk was too close, and Ione too far. There didn't appear to be anything in the middle, but I took a chance and headed toward Ione anyway. I found the Outpost Cafe and Resort, which was a nice campsite along the river. I set up camp, showered, and then headed for dinner in the cafe. I figured with the way my rain luck was going it would start pouring again while I was attempting to cook dinner. It turns out it would have been fine - but homemade soup and a "chicken burger" tasted pretty good.
After dinner, I spent some time chatting with my neighbors for the night - all in RVs. I was the only "tenter" in the campsite. When they told me that site I was on was under water last night it made me a bit nervous - but it doesn't look like rain tonight, and the river looks pretty calm. Here's hoping it stays that way. I think the tent is far enough away from the river!
I finally ran into some other cyclists on the road today - but of course they were all headed the other way. The first guy was from Maine. He was doing the Adventure Cycling Northern Tier route solo as his first bike trip. It sounded like he was worried about being alone the whole way. I told him about the hiker biker campsites in Glacier National Park - they should at least give him some company for dinner. In the 3 nights I spent in hiker biker campsites in Glacier last year, there were always several other people sharing the site. The next cyclists were a group of three - looking for a campsite that I believe is on the other side of the river. Unfortunately, the Adventure Cycling map had the campground symbol on the south side of the river, but the description implied it was on the other side. Then there was a couple from Maryland. They started in Vancouver and need to be back in Maryland by August 12th, which sounds like it is really pushing it. They said the Cascades and the weather were getting to them. We're all hoping for a change in the weather soon. The last two groups both went around Sherman Pass - and both recommended the bypass route in the Adventure Cycling maps. The guy from Maine confirmed my understanding that coming east to west I would face a 20 mile climb. I think I will use one of the bypass routes - either the one on the Adventure Cycling map, or a longer bypass into Canada. I need to figure out if I have time for the Canada option - that one sounds more interesting to me.
It looks like I'll have a relatively steep but short climb over Tiger Pass tomorrow, destination Colville. It may be a bit short of mileage, but there appears to be a shortage of places to stay beyond there, so I think I'll only attempt to go as far as Colville.
