Merry X-Mas in July! To celebrate X-mas we had a Secret Santa, which was really hilarious and fun. Matt Harlan had me as a secret santa, and he drew me an awesome picture to frame and stickers to put on my water bottles. Wayy too cool. A lot of the other gifts were gags, and costumes to wear on our bikes. Tim rode with lights and garland to resemble a X-Mas tree, and he surprisingly did not get that many weird looks as anticipated.
Washington was hot! Every newspaper we came across broadcasted the recordbreaking temperatures, and we can attest to that! We had one 102 mile day that actually wasn't that bad. The group I was riding with stopped to pick cherries, apricots, and unripened grapes. We also stopped periodically to run through the sprinklers, which was a necesity because of the heat. Unfortunately, atleast half the team ate too many cherries, which was evident by the lines outside of the bathrooms.
I drove the day into Mt. Rainer, which was a beautiful, (but again), hot ride. Our campsite was awesome, and the trails through the waterfalls and forests were amazing. On the rest day, some of the team and I road tripped to Mt. Saint Helen, which was really cool to see. Most of the trees are still floating in the lake, and you can see everything that had been singed by the explosion in 1980.
We made it to the coast yesterday! The ride yesterday was hilly in the beginning, and it flattened out towards the end. It was the best feeling when we rolled into Seaside. The other groups arrived before we did, so they cheered us on as we tossed our clothes and bikes aside and ran to the Pacific Ocean. On our way into the ocean, we got high-fives and hugs, which felt amazing. We made it coast to coast! We had access to the hottub, pool, showers, and TV (with Disney movies!) at our stayover. There's not much more that we could ask for.
Today's ride was the last "real" ride of the trip. We ended up in Hillsboro, which is about 25 miles outside of Portland. The ride was hilly and bumpy! We were on really bad roads for about 50 miles, but for the last 25 the road was smoother and bearable. Our stayover is amazing! We have a shower, laundry, pizza, and SaeBin's parents are providing dinner for us. Awesome!