Epic solo trip

I took Thursday and Friday off last week planning to ride my bike a little bit on the eastside.  I got my bike fixed and picked it up in Tacoma on Thursday.  I then rode from downtown Tacoma out to Point Defiance Park to catch the ferry out to Vashon.

I missed the ferry and hung out on the beach for a little while.

I rode south to north on Vashon Island, then caught the ferry over to Southworth, where I rode up to Manchester state park and met up with Meghan.  We camped there Thursday night.

The next day I dropped Meghan off in Tacoma then drove out to the John Wayne Pioneer bike trail outside of Cle Elum.

But there was too much snow on the trail to ride very far.

So I drove out to the Teanaway River Road and road pretty much every fork of that road, about 20 miles in all. 

This is the end of the road right now, where the dirt road begins that leads up to the Navaho Pass trailhead and some of the other Teanaway valley access points (this is the next valley over from the stewart range).

The Mighty Teanaway.

Mt Stewart and friends.

Stewart

After that I drove out to the Columbia and hung out for a while at Wanapum State Park on the banks of the Columbia.

But I didn't feel like paying for a campsite so I drove out to Ancient Lakes, packed up by backpack, and hiked in.

The sunset

The next day I hiked around the Ancient Lakes basin for a while, then drove back to the Columbia to do another bike ride.  I wanted to ride through the Hanford site, but I decided to meet up with Kelly Sheridan that evening so I figured I'd save that ride for another day.  I parked at Rocky Reach Dam and rode up the Columbia to the Entiat River Road.  I had a great tailwind up the Columbia, but then when I turned onto Entiat River Road I was riding straight into a fierce headwind, slightly uphill.  It was slow going.  So I went five miles then turned around and rode back.  About 32 miles in all.

Then I drove to Leavenworth and up the Icicle Creek Road to meet up with Kelly.  I had a fun time camping with Kelly and all his climbing friends in the Icicle Creek Canyon in a parking lot.   The next day I woke up early and hiked a ways up the Icicle Ridge trail.  Then I went out to the 59er Diner for breakfast thinking I would ride up the Chiwawa River Road and see how far the snow went.

Well, it turned out I could only go 8-10 miles up that road, as far as Meadow Creek Campground.

It was a great ride, then I got to the end of the road.

After that I packed my bike back up and drove over the pass to Index, where I went for a run and a quick dip in the river before driving home.

All in all, I did 4 bike rides, camped out three nights, and did a good bit of hiking.  And it was sunny all weekend so I got a little sun tan.  It was a pretty great long weekend.