Weekend at the river

Pat and I left Thursday after work for a Friday National Forest ride up in Colville NF.

The ride was pretty and we got some great views. But... and there's a "but," I screwed up the mapping/route part and so it could've have been a more rad ride. We ended up just riding 20 miles with tons of hard hill. In fact, of the 5 or so hours we were out, I'd say we were climbing for about 3.5 of those. I'm still raspy and lame -- Friday's ride has convinced me to go find a respiratory specialist, because I'm just stuck and I can't do sustained climbs.

Standard NF setup. Rawland dSogn bling. Water filter up front.
Food, rain jacket, emergency bivy, small aide kit in the rear.

This should not be the take-away though. The ride was beautiful. Pat brought his dog, Brandy with us, and we got to chill by the river when we got home, which upgrades any event by at least two levels of radness. All in all, a good day.

Anyway. Here's the stinking elevation story according to the GPS.

That last 5.5 miles ruled.

In addition to a fair-to-middling ride, two important discoveries were unearthed in the Kettle Falls and Ferry County country.

Pat tried out his new water purifier zapper. Super easy.

First. There is such a thing as righteous lager microbrew. (I need to give the Airway Heights guys another shot). On the way up to the river on Thursday, we stopped at Northern Ales Brewery to fill the growler.  Pat tried their "Grouch Ale," at it ruled. When I see pictures of miners or old west-type dudes sitting at a bar, this is the beer I imagine they were drinking: a lager with flavor. Here's the kicker: there's a distinctly sour flavor to it that just rocks. It's low ABV -- 3% -- so it's a great summer session beer.

I'm going to make it a minor life project to get that beer piped in at Benni's or some other local place.

Second: Four miles away from our river place is a little place called "Boyd's Country Inn." It's your basic rural road side tavern. But it's got screaming fast broadband. As in free WiFi. As in, potential office? The mind reels.

Maddie and Megan spent most of Saturday on the trike.

On Friday night, Liza, Maddie, Maddie's friend, Megan, and Pat's wife, Patty showed up. And we had a good old fashion river hang.

Salad days indeed.

Liza's River Rock.