Shut Up Legs Tours

This was about a 75 mile day. I got out of Jessie Honeyman's State Park before any of the other cycle tourists got up. It must have been the lack of coffee but I suddenly realized that Oregon's rumble strip is the best one for cyclists. It seems they can paint and somehow pattern the blacktop all in one process. Plus, it is narrow, does not extend into the shoulder where cyclists ride, and also is not so deep like some that almost knock you off your bike. Anyhow, kudos to Oregon Transportation Dept for this design and hopefully other states will copy it. This critter had been hit by a car but was still alive. I thought it was a beaver at first but then realized the tail indicates something else. This thing was pretty big at around 7 - 8 pounds. Anyone know what it is? Gardiner has to be one of the saddest looking towns along the Oregon coast. The only people I saw were digging out in the mud -  I am guessing for clams. I finally made it to Reedsport and sto...

There is a hospitality center at South Beach where the best tool for cycling the Oregon Coast is available free. The volunteers in there give me this map of the coast that has everything the cycling tourist will want: names of campgrounds with hiker/biker sites; elevation profiles, distances, and alternate bike routes. Whoever put this together did an outstanding job as this is easily the most useful map I have ever had. The nice ladies also told me of a breakfast spot in Waldport called Dan O's that some people on Yelp have given terrible reviews. It is true the waitress smokes outside and everything they said, but, the breakfasts here are huge and coffee cup is bottomless. There are two signs outside - one says Dan O's and one says Carols. Apparently it is in some kind of transition right now. I liked the food and also got into a discussion with a trucker at the next table. We talked about cyclists and how he is deathly afraid of hitting someone and tries his best. He d...

Left McMinnville and headed to the coast. On the way I detoured slightly off 18 to go through Sheridan and Willamina. There was a nice bakery in Willamina that had decent coffee so I got my caffeine fix there. Sheridan was a depressed looking area though the mill was going. My first planned destination was Devils Lake which is supposed to have a hiker/biker camping site but though I looked at two different places it was not apparent to me. It was too early in the day to stop anyways but thought it would be worth checking out in case it was so awesome I would be compelled to stop. So, on down the coast I rolled. Devils Lake First picture of the Oregon Coast One of many alternate bike routes off the main 101 Sometimes you saw these signs for alternate routes and sometimes not There is a bike shop listed on warmshowers.org that will let cycle tourists shower there and is supposed to have lots of stuff for the cycle tourist. They were very friendly and gave me gr...

Today is the start of the 550 mile tour out to the Oregon Coast and back to Mount Shasta. McMinnville is about 45 miles away which is perfect but there is no camping around there that was listed on-line. Chris suggests checking our airbnb.com where people list rooms like a B&B. I find one that looks nice for $60 and book it. There were surely better ways to get to McMinnville but with my GPS not having a complete map set and me not being prepared with more detailed maps I decided to stick with the main road which is 99W. It is pretty busy and with the July 4th weekend coming up it was a non-stop parade of pickups with trailers, RV's, cars, and tractor-trailers. Getting close to McMinnville now Downtown McMinnville I meet up with Marty and Paula my airbnb hosts . The "room" turned out to be the whole upstairs including a den/sitting room, a "Sun" room, bath and bedroom. Everything was very clean and tastefully decorat...