Day 1 - what is with all the hills...and rain?

Today's ride started in the town of Tukwila which is just east of the Seattle-Tacoma airport and about 15 miles south do downtown Seattle.  Of course it was cold and raining at 10 when we left.  Three blocks from the hotel we found ourselves riding up this mile long monster hill which was longer and steeper than any hill I've trained on in Fort Worth (major foreshadowing here).  We rode 12 miles northeast to catch the ferry across the Puget Sound to Southport (this was about a 40 minute) ride.  I'm tempted to count the miles as part of the overall journey but for now I'll leave them out.  If, however, when we get to San Francisco the total miles end up being 995, you better believe I'm tacking them on.  

Once off the ferry, we rode west through Port Orchard on Hwy 160 for about 20 miles to the town of Belfair(see Jerry).  The ride to that point could best be described as hilly with decent weather and beautiful forests, although we were riding into a 10 mph headwind.  Once the downpour in Belfair had ended we were back on the road going South on HWY 3 toward Shelton.  This was an additional stretch of 24 miles which for the most part was reasonable with no major hills to speak of.  Unfortunately, we did hit rain.  Not quite the gully washer that we hid from in Belfair, but a consistent rain nonetheless.  We decided to push through as fatigue was starting to set in and we were cold and wet.  We ended up riding the last 8 miles to Shelton in the rain.  Did I mention we were cold, wet, and tired?

The good news was that we were now only 7 miles from the hotel.  As tonight is the season premier of 24 I opted for the hotel instead of the tent.  As cold and wet as I was, it was. Wise choice on a number of fronts.  But I digress.  So Jerry had warned us that on the way out of Shelton we would encounter another major hill, what he failed to mention was that the major hill was also a mile long and once you got to the top, you had to go up a second hill, son of a gun!  The rain had stopped by this time though and we were closing in on the hotel.  We finally arrived at about 5:00 PM at the Little Creek Resort in the small town of Kimilche, where the rack rate was a reasonable $69.00.  If you can get past the cigarette smoke permeating the building from the attached casino, it's worth every penny to this tired, cold, wet traveller.  60 miles total logged today.

Time for some 24!

Tomorrow we head for the coast where I pray the land is flatter, and sunnier.  We stop on the town of Raymond.  Until then.