Day 9

 First, new category: marginally useful information.
   a.  There is skiing 12 months a year at Timberline.  One consequence of this is that ski teams from all over America and elsewhere come here for periods of time to train.  At 6:45 fleets of young ski kids trouped up the slopes for slalom training.  The Japanese national development team was there on the morning we left.  Interesting overall.
   b.  The town of Detroit where we spent last night has 176 winter residents.  The proprietress of our motel is the mayor and the guy who ran the hot dog stand at the marina across the street is on the city council (I don't know the other members).
   c.  Apart from the heat exhaustion (mercifully now passed) and the conventional diaper rash that is conventional on such endeavors, I have only standarized minor health problems.  Somehow or another I acquired a substantial abrasion on the top of my left thigh.  With the continual rubbing and profusion of bodily fluids, I am having a hard time eliminating this.  My chief hope is to prevent infection breaking out before  getting home.  Secondarily, on the super hot days my feet swelled a bit which, in this case, resulted substantial blood bruises on a couple of toes, which, I should say, hurt like crazy.  Apart from these conventional problems, I'm doing well and getting stronger.  I hope it continues.

Day 9
If yesterday was a cruising, pleasant day, today was a beast.  125 miles with oodles of climbing.  The first 27 miles were confidence sapping  "false flat" and then the serious climbing began in which we climbed for 10 more miles.  Then over the next 10 miles we gave back every inch of elevation.  Then began a @20 mile climb to Mackenzie Pass.  From there were views of the Three Sisters

and Mt. Washington

 More remarkable than the mountain vistas was the extraordinary lava fields that cover the entire top of the pass which is only hinted at in the above photo.  Quite amazing really.  It was interesting an tough. From there the next 40 miles was a descent and a run into Bend.  An interesting, worthy day.

An interesting aside: tomorrow is the start of the Cascades Classic cycling race.  The BMC development team was riding the same route we were to recon the climb which is a key part of the second stage .  The group included the under-23 national champion and a fairly large group with him and support cars.  Several of them stopped and took pics where we did.  They were SO young.  It was amazing to see them.

Tomorrow is another long, 125 miles, tough day.  The most noteworthy part of  the route is a mile 15 that begins within 5 miles of the start of the ride.  YUUUUCK! I expect to survive.  If so, I will try to report.