A fine day for motorcycling

The weather forecast for today was for a cloudy day without rain. We rode out of Portland on the I-205 north across the Columbia River and then turned east immediately on highway 14. The first few miles were on a freeway, but this soon shrank to a scenic single lane road. The traffic lessened the further we rode, and we soon pretty much had the road to ourselves. The views over the river were spectacular.

 A bit further down the road we came to the Bridge of the Gods and took it into Oregon just for the experience of crossing it. The road across the bridge has a steel grid road surface (see next photo), through which you can see all the way, way down to the river (!). It is a toll bridge, and we thought we would have to pay a second time when we turned around and rode back, but the lady at the toll booth was really nice and only charged us the one toll - all of 50 cents.

We made our first stop for coffee at the Venus Cafe in Stevenson. here we met Brian, a friendly local, and spent some time chatting to him and his friend who joined us after the first cup. We had a lot in common - he was a scuba diver, and in past years a motorcyclist. He and his friend both knew a lot about Australia from documentaries, and we talked a lot about our respective home countries.

While we were there, we could not help but notice a copper and brass tree sculpture on the wall of the cafe that reminded us of some of Warren Townsend's work.

Ten miles further along highway 14 we reached Lyle, where we stopped for lunch. Another group of bikers arrived soon after. One couple, Mel and Patty, riding a BMW K1200LT came up and introduced themselves. We chatted about our bikes for a while before they headed off with their friends.

From Lyle, we took a scenic road north up the Klickitat River valley to the little town of Klickitat, and then on to Goldendale. Returning back to highway 14 at Maryhill, we stopped briefly at the replica of Stonehenge.

Our itinerary nominally had us staying at Maryhill for the night, but it was only 2:30 when we got there and we were feeling fresh and ready to travel on to get ahead of schedule - especially with fine weather today and rain forecast for tomorrow. The road east from Maryhill was through country unlike anything we have experienced so far in the US. The hills were covered in golden grass and low bushes that looked like the saltbush we have in Australia, and almost completely devoid of trees.

It was almost completely devoid of habitation, too, with two tiny towns and no services for the next 80 miles. The road was in top condition and mostly straight, so we found ourselves travelling at 70 mph most of the way, but it was a boring ride - much like the road from Canberra to Cooma (back in Australia). Plymouth, on the Washington side of the river was just a collection of camp sites, so we crossed the Columbia River back into Oregon to stay overnight in the tired town of Umatilla.