View Larger MapAnother great day of riding. Today capped a great weekend of riding and hanging out. Joe and I enjoyed the perfect weather today and took a spin out to Loon Lake. We stuck mostly to the back roads. We enjoyed some nice dirt roads. And I got bit by a dog -- on my bum.
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This is a typical road that we traveled today. Nice rural roads with low traffic.
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This is a tick I found on my ankle as we sat and drank a cup of coffee in Deer Park. Pretty gross, eh? Nasty little parasitic bastard. When I got home later in the day, I took a shower and two more fell off me. Yuck! I expect these little bastards hitched a ride when Alex and I rode through the waist-high grass a couple days ago. I don't know how they survived one shower on Saturday, but not today's? Whatever. I hope I got them all.
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Joe's sister-in-law has a cabin on Loon Lake. After lunching at the famed Dinner Bell, we drug out the kayaks and took a quick spin around the west side of the lake. I've not really done any kayaking. I tipped it over instantly and got soaked. Otherwise, I found it to be a perfect complement to cycling. Your legs just lay there while the upper body does all the work. Fun.
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This is a typical phone-cam shot: cruddy. The clouds were amazing today. I'd never thought of our clouds until the discussion on MetroSpokane about our
amazing Spokane clouds last week. Yeah, we do have pretty sweet clouds.
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The area we rode through was really neat in its ruralness. Unlike the south/palouse area, which seems to attract the McMansion crowd, much of the north west area is still more traditional rural. There's a McMansion or McWanky Northwestern Log Cabin here and there, but overall, the region is really charming and still has a lot of original, small churches and lots of grange halls. All of these buildings were in operation.
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When I got back to Spokane, I showered quickly and pedaled up to my parents' house for a Father's Day feast (Liza and Maddie are out of town this week). Look at that dinner: corn on the cob; grill roasted asparagus salad; grilled portobello with tomato, sweet onion, basil, and mozzarella; and a grilled pepper stuffed with herbed rice. WORD!
My mom is such a great cook.
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1 comment:
Wow! What a great ride, kayaking and outstanding food. I used to have a cabin on the North shore of Loon and miss it a lot. We tended to say away from "The Bell" though.
I too had a great weekend. I painted (http://freshabundance.com/freshblog/?p=107) and ate a couple of Bumble Bars.
Ok, maybe it wasn't so great. But the Bumble Bars were tasty!
If you get killed by ickytick oogies can I have one of your bikes?
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