Moving into the final stretch, I’m now targeting a Saturday finish in Astoria. I feel like a man on a mission, the good kind, not the Viking kind where their goal was to steal land, silver and gold, and take a few unwilling guests back to their homeland. Sarcasm aside, I can’t help but relate this to the history of what I’ve witnessed following the Lewis & Clark trail. You may notice in the Strava pics, there are many historical sites and current landmarks dedicated to the Nez Pearce people, who were so instrumental to the success of L&C’s mission. Later in the same century, the flight of the Nez Pearce is a sad piece of our nation’s history. My mom admired that as a young boy I loved “Cowboy and Indian” movies, rooting for the latter, but she would find me crying if they “lost” (spoiler alert, I’m “cryer”). Even at this young age, something struck me about Native Americans. Maybe the kid in me just loved “the look” and the cool horses (note lots of horse pics too in Strava), but I’d like to think it was about respect of the land and their spiritual ethos. Unfortunately, I’m not saddled up on a beautiful, American Paint horse that is bringing the horsepower to my trip. However, the stats from Sunday and Monday suggest that my “horse is smelling the barn”, picking up steam going from Montana to Idaho. On Sunday, I clocked 86 miles at a 16.2 mph pace and today covered 101 miles averaging 15.7 mph. I’m slated for another a big ride on Wednesday as I push into Washington and will try to muster my inner-Secretariat.
