We started off at about 6:30am on this day after a rest day in Omak. We started by stopping at McDonald's for breakfast, then were off by 7am. We had nice leisurely ride into Tonasket, where we met up for a snack at a restaurant. Then we up towards the Wacunda pass.
That was a difficult ride, it was very steep for the first 5 miles, then it leveled out. Just about then, Doug and Terese (on the tandem) broke a 6th spoke, which necessitated a good long break. Then onwards and upwards we went.
At this point, my knees really started to hurt, they'd been hurting pretty badly every time I pushed on the pedals, but now they were throbbing. A few advil, and a rest break and I went back to it.
Then to make matters worse, my pedal fell apart! I was riding along, and I noticed that my pedal was wiggling around a lot. I stopped to take a look, and noticed that the cap was off, and a nut had fallen out. I tighted the one remaining nut and took off again, only to have it and the whole pedal fall of 200 feet later. With Bob's help, we jury rigged a new screw to hold it on, though it still slid back and forth a lot. Finally, we got up to Wacunda, a town that is supposed to be near the top of the pass. Only the store was closed, and we found the steepest section was still ahead of us.
Finally, we crested the pass, and screamed down the other side into Republic. After some discussion, the group split up, Jeff, Jim, Don, and I enjoyed a pizza dinner, and the rest of the crew headed to an RV park off of route 21.
When we left the restaurant, we came across Doug and Terese, who had spent the entire time repairing another broken spoke. We called around to find a bike shop, but found out it had closed down, then we made the 5 mile trek to the RV park. The ride felt long, but the campground was beautiful. The grass was very green, and inviting, and we had a large fenced off site all to our selves.
After warm shower, the clouds opened up and it was off to bed.
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