Road ride back was almost my terror.
Comfortable sleep last night; van cooled off and the mosqs were on the outside this night.
Slept till 7:00, rolled out of bed and turned to. Today is a big technical day. D & T is a 13 mile stretch down in Umpqua river canyon, once you drop in you are in until bail out @ 10 miles. I left @ 10:00.
D & T is temporarily closed because of flooding. I decided to make a go of it. Big drop in from Lemola lake to river. Water and weak mud abounded. Some places the trail was the run off. Great deep woods wet forest woods dirt trails, like Alpine but with more pedaling. Made the dreaded flooded section. At first there was some ankle deep mud, then some free flowing h20, mixed in were some chain saw cut out logs, then some mid skin deep h2o, all in about 150 yards if that far. Concern was based on no real knowledge.
Exited out @ Umpqua Hot Spring. Official bridge across river has been out for several years. FS can not sanction a make due bridge over a 3′ log that has about 20″ of rough sawn planking bolted into the log. I walked across w/o bike to learn of what to expect. A fall off the bridge might be a drowning, certainly loosing the bike. I liked what I felt and crawled over the root ball to get onto bridge. Made it and the hot springs parking lot. Popular place this spring. Just a hole in rock like a square tank maybe 4′ deep and 5′ square. I soaked in it one Thanksgiving trip. Today it was just too hot to add more heat to my overworked cooling system.
Rode to Toketee camp ground and searched for where I was dunked into the river last time I was here to chase away the heat stroke I was experiencing. Couldn’t find the hole, perhaps spring floods washed it out. Cold h2o saved my life as I was in convulsions and no muscle strength. I bonked returning to XG. I knew my skin was dry as in no perspiration but I attributed that to the high temp and low humidity. I iced myself but it didn’t seem to be working. I laid down on crushed gravel in shade of van and soon started to convulse. I was getting freaked. I called for help, at first rather timid. As the convulsions grew I cried louder. A couple came to my rescue. The towel soaked in ice h2o wasn’t enough, still too hot. I asked to be taken to river. They drunk drug me into the knee deep cold h2o. Shorty I was convulsing from hypothermia. I was now too cold. But that was last trip.
Today I planned on refilling my hydration bladder @ same XG. No h2o in XG. OK, I will pick a stream and fill up. I rode back up river trail to hot springs to pick up gravel logging road to return to van. At hot spring I found a small free flowing dark woods babbling trickle and filled up.
The ride back was 10 miles of some shade, 87″ and a climb. I drank freely. I sensed that I wasn’t sweating profusely in spite of all h2o drunk. My pits were wet so i knew I was still sweating. What a slog. A car coming from the other direction actually stopped well before I met up and let me pass in dust free air. I thanked him as that was the first anybody did that for me. I walked several times to stretch my legs out. Last mile was downhill and I continued that downhill into the Lemola Lake resort to the boat launch. i shucked my helmet, gloves, pack, & glasses and walked in. Good & chilly sluffed the heat.
Rode back to van slowly. I opened the fridge for a beer and saw that the dreaded “F” was displayed meaning the fridge wasn’t working. Discovered that I ran out of propane because the stove wouldn’t light. I packed up quickly and drove back to resort hoping they had propane to save a drive back to Diamond. Success. Full tank & back @ camp site.
Solar shower, rehydration, & rest. My legs are precramping. Randy, I ate maybe a teaspoon of mustard. How much should I eat?
Tomorrow it is down stream from Toketee. Bridges across the river will determine length of ride. Down lower poison ivy edges the trail. I will probaly ride highway 138 back up stream instead of pushing ST. But that is tomorrow.