Fun on a Bike

It is a pleasure to announce that yesterday's bike ride was actually fun. We rode 6.2 miles without any mishaps. As I mentioned in yesterday's post, we live less than 10 miles away from Champoeg State Heritage Area, but we've never before visited. As we drive down the road going pretty much anywhere, we see signs directing us there, but we never comply. Now that we've seen it, I'm sure we'll visit more often. The trail was a biking trail, but it could also be a walking trail. Indeed, there were many walkers on the trail, including one elderly man and woman we passed going both directions who were busy picking the wild blackberries, eating them as they picked.

So, let's start with the history of the place:

It's interesting to me that the six negotiated treaties from just this one location all went unratified by Congress. One wonders what would be the point of negotiating treaties that wouldn't be ratified. It provides a clue why so many treaties were never honored. Perhaps they were never ratified. And without going off on a tangent politically, one wonders if the negotiations were undertaken in good faith. All questions to ponder.

But coming back to the present, there was a wide paved trail for bicycles and walkers. We had in mind to ride the four miles to the Butteville store. It's one more never-visited place just a few miles away from where we live.

We were enticed by this sign at the beginning of the trail and at several locations along the way. Snacks? Count us in. Oh, and ice cream? Definitely. We even thought to take our masks along since Oregon is back to a statewide indoor mask mandate. (Please get vaccinated if you can.)

And the ride went really well. We bought the eBikes to accommodate my bum knee. Pedaling a bike hurts my knee, but with an eBike, I can pedal for a while, and then rest my knee by using the "pedal assist," which is an electric motor that powers the bike. We rode as far as we could. As it turns out, we would have been required to travel the last half mile or so on a public street, along with traffic, and so we turned around upon that realization. There's no way I'm confident enough to ride with traffic, bike lane or not.

The ride was a little taxing for my shoulder, but even more taxing for my thumb. Opening my hand wide to hold both the handle-bar and the brake was tiring after a while. Also, the throttle for the electric bike motor is operated with the right thumb, and that started to hurt after a while. On the way back, I found it necessary to stop and give both my shoulder and my thumb a rest. We were riding right alongside the Willamette River. This is what we saw in the place we stopped.

We rested about five minutes. The fingers in both hands were numb, and when I was able to feel them and wiggle them again, we rode the remaining distance to where our car was parked.

I kind of wanted to see the "village" that was mentioned in much of the signage. There was a walking trail from the parking lot the led to it. We walked some distance and were starting to think it was all a snare and a delusion. And then we realized...what you see below is all that's left of the "village." The post in the foreground has the names of two streets, and there was a row of them. If you look closely about 1/3 of the way down on the left side, you can see another post. They went on...maybe a half dozen or so...from there.

On the way back, we ventured again to the banks of the river. There's a drop-off to the water, which gave us some indication how much water must have been flowing to completely wipe out the village back in the mid-1860's. In our years in Oregon, we've only seen once where the Willamette flooded the surrounding areas, but this would not have been one of those places.

Where we stood, there was a sprinkling of wild sweet peas, and this was the only blooming thing we saw here.

So that's the farthest I've ridden since my accident back in December. I'm still a little nervous. On this ride, I asked Mike if we should even do it given that I'm picking up 60 lbs. of tomatoes today. Who would do the canning if I messed myself up again? As it turns out, no worries.

It was mid-afternoon by the time we returned home. The kitties were snoozed out on their favorite quilts.

It was too late in the day for them to go outside, but they didn't seem to mind. Sometimes a good nap day is what a guy really needs.

So, yes, tomatoes are in my future. I probably won't start today, but for sure tomorrow. Today, I need to finish up a couple of housekeeping chores, and I want to do a little more slow-stitching. The next three days have been set aside for pasta sauce and one more batch of salsa. I won't come up for air until it's all done.

You folks in the path of Henri, please stay safe.