Day 61, Aug. 16 Raymond to Cape Disappointment S.P., WA

This could have been our last day, but we decided to drag it out.

We woke up on this Saturday morning, ready to head down the coast of Washington to Ilwaco, where we would get our first taste of non-bay waters and see the Pacific!

We stopped at their downtown cafe where we ate breakfast among the other early risers (no one close to our age). The waitress warned us that the pancakes were large when I ordered 2, but unfortunately we chose to ignore her warnings, and even with our well developed appetites, could not finish the pancakes.

Feeling quite full, we turned onto 101 to head towards South Bend, the little port town that first says hi to the bay.

This was where the salt water really became a reality and signs for oysters and fishing nets started appearing everywhere.

Our ride down the coast (which you can't always) see was a good mixture of hilly and flat and I felt some upper muscles in my legs burn that I hadn't really heeded since the Appalachians. Even though, we were now on this leg though, our minds were still unoccupied and so we tuned in again to the Ipod, which eventually gave out on us.

At the point it did though, we were going into an area where we could see more of the tapering bay, so we started to focus more on that and the fact that this signified the end of our trip, which, although slightly desperate for, might be hard to process.

The ride went really fast, we only did about 45 miles though, and before you knew it, the temperature had dropped about 20 degrees and a great fog was moving along beside us. Then was the sign "Seaview" which we rushed for, and once we were on the beach we were engulfed in cold cold clouds that obscured almost all the view, but you could still hear the waves breaking. We took off our shoes and walked into the water, which was awfully cold, but not so cold as it seemed about 10 seconds later when the very bones in your foot suddenly started to ache with a throbbing pain.

We hopped out refreshed, only to find a family desperately trying to push their car out of the sand. After taking a picture of their embarrassing predicament, we went over and helped, then walked back to the water to wash off our feet. Not 2 seconds later another family had gotten stuck in the sand, although this one had 3 only 3 scrawny kids in it to help their father push, so we also obliged them with a push. Then as we walked back to our bikes, yelled in the window at any low cars that looked eager to try their turn on the sand.

A few miles still from Ilwaco, which we had heard had some delicious seafood, Andy was stopped for his bike mechanic tools and skills by some locals having trouble with their seat angles.

Then we were in Ilwaco, where, when the fog wasn't too thick, we could see the Oregon mountains across the big mouth of the Columbia River. We strolled around their town and through their Saturday market at the port, looking at knicknacks that we had no interest in. After a bit, we decided it was time to try our seafood dinner, and so we headed to one that looked quite pleasant. After choosing our dinners, we sat for a while, and sat longer, until finally we decided that we should probably go somewhere else where someone might actually wait on us. We strolled out and down to the next restaurant, got menus, sat down, and then, as they only had fried seafood and fry baskets, opted to again go elsewhere. We walked to 3 or 4 other restaurants, all of which were either closed (it was like 3:30) and too expensive, or didn't serve seafood at all. At some point, we realized we were super hungry and split a cup of salmon chowder from a vendor just so we wouldn't bite each other's head off. I was pretty sad that we had left our first venue and Andy was being very patient with me. Still hungry, but a little less unfed, we headed back into the main part of town to see if anything there might look appealing. Our pride prevented us from going back to restaurant number 1. The place we ended up at was a strange little cafe that was tucked in the back of an antiques mall, was short staffed (on account of someone being down at the fair) and the only seafood they served was skewered shrimp and fries. Andy had a burger and I ordered the shrimp, which ended up being fried on a stick and in no way resembling a shrimp. The only good part about the meal (aside from the ice cream we ate at the end of it) was that the owner of the building was sitting near us and struck up a conversation and gave us the rundown on the rise and fall of logging, the fact that most of the seafood in the area doesn't get fished there, and the quickest way to get to Cape Disappointment State Park.

Realizing we needed to cook a real dinner when we arrived at the park, we stopped at the grocery store, where the highlight was cousin Shaggy calling to give us the low down on meeting them the following day in Seaside, OR (where they would take us in and feed us :). This lifted our spirits and we set off on our foggy, hilly, chilly ride the few miles to the cape.

The park had hiker/bicyclist camping spots and after we set up camp, we wandered down to the beach, which was oddly strewn with lots of lots of driftwood of various sizes. Much of the wood had been made into various huts and haunts, some that were pretty substantial. Although we couldn't see very far (perhaps this is the disappointing part), the site was still beautiful and we could just make out the lighthouse up on the cliff to our left.

Eventually, it became rather chilly and we decided it was time to go back to camp and build a fire. The firewood was a ripoff ($7) but it was pretty cold and damp so we ate the money and enjoyed our evening much more as a result. This dinner was much more satisfying and we toasted our last night on the trail before Andy finished his day with a freezing shower (which I, now well-informed, skipped) and we went to bed in our tent, for the last time. (for a while)