Day 9: Vale, OR to Boise, ID — 73 miles

Today, I said goodbye to Oregon and hello to Idaho. Oregon was wonderful to me, and I have many great memories of the things I have seen and done, and the people I have met.

However, today I discovered something that I didn’t even know I was missing until I found it: choice.

For many parts of Oregon, and in particular, many parts of Oregon that I biked to, there was really only one choice for how to get there. Going to the Painted Gorge? You need to take Rt. 26 to get there. You don’t like this stretch of 126 to McKenzie Bridge? Deal with it, or don’t go there.

Today I had options, or more importantly, I took advantage of my options.

In the morning, I left Vale on Rt. 26, and while there was a nice-sized shoulder on the road, the volume of traffic was very high. I wasn’t really afraid of being struck, but being passed every few seconds by a semi truck, or a moving van, or a construction vehicle just wasn’t very pleasant. And I had about 20 miles of this until the next major town (and even more after that). So after six or seven miles, I thought, ‘If I’m not having a good time, why am I doing this?’

I found the next available turn off, and took out my GPS to see if there might be another way to get to my destination. By a happy coincidence — my charmed biking life continues — the very road I had chosen to take to check the options was, in fact, a road that went where I was going. Even though the road took a bit of a climb, I took it anyway.

Next to a railroad track in Idaho

It was the best decision of the day. The climb got me above and away from the busy Rt. 26, and while the back country roads were rolling and had more work involved, the overall experience was so much better that I didn’t care.

It turned out that the area was the beginning of a major agricultural area. I mentioned in a previous post that the region felt more agricultural, but this was beyond a simple feeling. It was just like being in rural Iowa (where I grew up). The roads were layed out in square grids, and I passed field after field of different crops: corn, onions, beets, mint. There was virtually no one on the roads, as I think I was passed once in the next five miles of cycling. It was so peaceful and so pleasant I felt right at home. The biggest problem I had was that twice I was chased by country dogs protecting their territory.

Just outside Middleton, a suburb of Boise

Eventually these back roads met up with Rt. 26 again and I passed over into Idaho officially at Nyssa. Then I immediately found another side road that bypassed the main road. I did this again and again all afternoon, and while I’m sure it slowed me down, checking the GPS map to see where a particular road went as well as soaking in the view; and I’m sure I climbed much more than if I had stayed on the main road, with all the rolling hills; and I’m sure the route I took was not the most efficient and I probably added several miles to my day-end total.

But I didn’t care about any of that. I’m not on this trip to take the most optimal route; I’m not on this trip to minimize my climbs; I’m not on this trip to get from point A to point B the fastest. I’m on this trip to see what there is to see, to see and hear — and, yes, smell — my environment. And that is what I got today. And it was good.

At the end of the day I met up with Shannon and his wife Stacey, whom I met through WarmShowers.org. I am now 3 for 3 in my WarmShowers.org interactions, as they were generous and kind, sharing their food, home, and dog with me, and we swapped stories about my trip and the trip that their family of four did last summer, biking from Acadia, Maine to Florence, Oregon.

Tomorrow is an off day for me, and I am planning to stay here with the Galinats for another day. It will be my first off day of the trip, and I hope to give my various aches and pains a chance to heal before I set out again. We’ll see how that goes.