Paul and Teresa's Bike Tour Adventure

We started out early Saturday morning, no alarm needed at 2 am to wake up. We rolled out of bed to the tune of thunder in the distance again. Our chauffeur to the truck stop and the rendezvous with the shuttle bus from Robert Q was not around when we woke up. I started thinking maybe the power was out due to the thunderstorm and he was going to forget us. He didn't. Thanks Matt. We ended up waiting at the truck stop for almost half and hour. The rain started and was heavy at times. We certainly were hoping that the skies would wring themselves out before we ever got onto our bikes.
We entered the shuttle bus a little later than scheduled and it turned out that there were other cyclists already on board. They were Louis Bosma of Aylmer and Pete Vannoord and Andy Devries of St. Thomas. They got on the shuttle after no sleep at all. At the border we had a slight delay due the requirement for all riders to entrance the customs building and producing documents in person. There was a slight delay as some of had more questions to answer than others. Another story for another day.
Arrived in Detroit and we soon meet Christina Nyehuis of Sarnia who would be flying on our flight as well. We were all able to sit together on the plane both on our connecting flight from Detroit to Chicagco and on our flight to Seattle.
Did you know that there is actually quite a bit of snow still in the mountains? I had no idea and was shocked. Hopefully it will provide a cooling effect after a hard day of cycling. While flying, all three ladies wrote in their journals and the men talked about the fact that they were going to do some journaling too. Then we had a nap. When not napping, we had fun taking photos of people taking photos of….
Seattle is a beautiful city with many trees and interesting neighbourhoods nestled in the rolling landscape. The are bays all around and the water looks so inviting. It is unusually hot (both Saturday and Sunday). I heard that it was 97 degrees F (please do the metric conversion yourself, I am in American mode now. I will switch back in 7 ½ weeks).
We assembled our bikes in the parking lot where the gear truck is located and then brought them UP to our rooms. It was a 5 minute climb up a 11% slope. I asked myself "DO WE HAVE ANY MORE LIKE THAT?" I already knew the answer.
We have met many old friends from 2005 and already starting new friendships.
We had our in-class safety training this morning. Teresa in currently in her training as leader of a small group. I am waiting now for our on-bike safety training, which down that hill to the parking lot. CAN I SLEEP THERE TONIGHT? Again, I know the answer.
Talk to you again soon.