In August and September 2007, Ellee biked a 2000 mile loop through Oregon, Washington, and Idaho. Along the way she's offering Cog-nizant Yoga Classes whose proceeds went to local non-profits. Visiting the myriad of yoga communities engaged in service was inspiring.
	Here's the blog.

So I'm finally getting jot down some of the happenings of this here tour. Right now, I'm in Baker City, OR typing on a computer in a Super 8 lobby. I had to ask the lady working the desk if I could turn down the Miss Teen USA contest that was on the GIGANTIC tv above the computer screen. Miss New Mexico made it to the next round btw. The other day a lady in an ice cream shop/antique store in Richland, OR let me go round back and use the internet from her desk. People are way nice. Staying connected is an adventure in itself. It would be too easy to leave my broken cell phone in the bottom of a pannier and totally absorb myself into the vagrant, smelly, assed-out lovliness of being a bike tourist whose main concern is how much mate is left to drink and where the most convinient place is to hang my hammock.

On biking.....I'm so proud of SoJo. She's holding up fabulously. She wants new handle bar tape and some lube soon....Maybe a little tightening of the front derailleur cable. She's so cute. It's been really hot. It doesn't help that we laze about in the morning drinking mate, ready the newspaper, doing yoga, and working out the cue sheets. 107 was the hottest recorded on Gretchen's odometer. At the end of the hot days, we are covered in salt. Rad. This route it littered with long elevation gains and soaring descents. The climbing is a grueling meditation for me and the downhill makes me believe in God. We've wound through purple mountains that bust up out of expansive desert valleys. Coyotes cross our pathes more that trucks on some roads. Other roads are closely protected by deep-green smelling forests. There is absolutely nothing that I would rather be doing in my life.

On RV parks....they are little pleasant American-flagged communities that have it figured out. They inhabit in some of the most ravishing landscapes of the US and bring their living rooms. Gretchen and I have stayed amongst their ranks with our hammocks and our giggling and general inappropriate nature. They are nice and show us where we need to go in their golf carts with their tiny, fluffy dogs in tow.

On the little details of our reality...Gretchen wears the same shirt everyday and we're lucky if she washes it. I alternate between two men's undershirts that I wash out in the shower/body of water nightly. In the small towns people eye-ball us and pull their children closer. We think we're fabulous. Filling camel backs is a skill that requires good judgement and finesse. In the funktified bathrooms of establishments across the Northwest, it is paramount to be saavy about where the valve might land as you futz with filling the bladder. People have different associations with things that look similar to a camel back. Best not to ever ask anyone to fill it. Sometimes when a nice motorist waves, I go to wave back and give them "the claw" as my hand does't understand being out of the biking position quick enough. Old men love to give directions. Even if it's to a town you're not going to. We just smile and they love it.

On people we've met....In Walla Walla, Nancy hosted us because my yoga class benefitted her organization. If anyone knows about grace, this woman does.

• We camped at a fromagerie in eastern Washington at the Montillets: artist/sheep cheese farmers. Their farm had frolicking, happy animals everywhere as well as magnificant art. The sheep got in my face in the middle of the night and matter of factly said "baaa." Over and over. A cat slept on my legs.
• A couple camping next to us in Crow Butte park in OR gave us a box of wine.
• We stayed at a "quilting retreat" (the basement of a quilting shop) called "Rather Bees"....because it's what a group of ladies in that town would rather be doing always.
• I met a fellow female bike tour guide in Lewiston, ID who worked in a bike shop when I led the Lewis and Clark tour. I returned on this scouting trip and didn't recognize her with a buzz cut. She had survived breast cancer and was bummed she missed out on the summer tours because of chemo. She's "so over it." She then and there told us about her deceased grandmother's house in Kooskia (where we were going) and told us where the keys were.
• In Dayville, OR, we got to talking to the locals and they pointed us towards "the church" which is a perfectly cute little white church on a green lawn that happens to host bike tourists. There are no signs or anything. You have to find about it by word of mouth and it's an oasis: laundry, internet, a kitchen, showers, the gospel. We were even allowed to sleep in the pews.

On yoga.....Some of the classes have been fantastic. We've earned a chunk of money for folks and the communities have been amazing, open hearted people. Thanks to Flow Yoga Studio in Hood River, Blue Heron Yoga Studio in Walla Walla, Kit Stafford in Sisters, and Corestar Cultural Center in Eugene!

Stories:

The Lumberjack and Frog Pond - A small little cafe that serves weak coffee and fried food is a bright light on a day shadowed with 3 passes to climb. So, after two passes, there we were running the waitress ragged as she attempted to keep our water glasses full, no to mention my iced tea and gretchen's soda. Then a gigantic table of young locals piled in. They were mostly guys but there were also several girls with babies in tow. Tequila and Bud light were ordered. It was the weekend. And they were headed to swim and sleep in trailers at Frog diggity dog Pond. That's what Lumberjack told us. We never caught his name. But, after he asked who we were, he insisted we come. They were going to drive the pick up onto the diving board. It was going to be a good time. Lumberjack was six foot five with big ole boots on and thick arms. He probably made any lady at the logger camp swoon. He stared at us as he ate french fries and asked us pointed questions....like about our funny tans (he personally confessed that he hadn't worn shorts in 3 years and showed us his white legs) and what we do fur fun where we're from. "Come on. Come to Frog Pond! It's gonna be a good time." I raised my eyebrows at Gretchen. "No," she said. So no Frog Pond for us, but I imagine Lumberjack will come for me like John Cusack in "Say Anything" and hold an old boom box up outside my tent...."your eyes, the light the heat, your eyes, I am complete, your eyes, a revolution, your eyes, 1000 churches."

"Closed Road": a term open for interpretation - The top of Mackenzie Pass is the highest point on our route. Officially it was closed for construction. If we didn't ride it, it meant I couldn't create my cues for work and we would have to reroute on a busy highway. Gretchen says, "It is really helpful not to listen to people." So we got some DL advice from a local bikey guy and headed up the pass anyway. The construction was on the other side of the pass, and at the magnificent observatory made of lava rock on top, we chatted with a whole bunch of folks that were telling us the road was impassable. This old dude without a shirt on really was focused on having us turn around (ie listen to him and do what he said). His story about how bad the road was got more and more elaborate. Eventually he said that they had blasted a "bridge" and we could only pass by flying. We said "thank you, sir" and continued on our way to his consternation. We saw no one for 6 miles until we ran into a young, pierced flagger smoking a ciggarette and holding a stop sign decorated with graffiti and ribbons. She said that we could pass, but we had to wait for her to get off work and hide in the bushes as the contractor drove out. They had just finished paving it. We almost got busted by the contractor. Before he left, he was talking to the flagger and Gretchen had inopportune, forest-shaking flatulence. Our subsequent (squelched) hilarity didn't help either. But we got through at 5:30 and rode virgin pavement using both lanes through some of the most gorgeous Cascadian forest. I scared an elk off the rode. There was no better way to ride the highest pass on our tour.

Anything not moving: It's what's for dinner - Eating is a fundamental and central activity on this bike tour. Our intention is not to be unladylike, but it happens sometimes (though our behavior is appropriate, some might say,for sweaty, road-grunged, lycra-clad road warriors). The verb eating can be interchanged seamlessly with the verb annialation. The flow of the tour, however, seldom allows opportunity for three meals. Two usually happen, and only one on the more unlucky rural camping days. So I'd like to mention the new terms for meals that we use at present: Linner (lunch and dinner closer to lunch time), Dunch (lunch and dinner closer to dinner time, Lunch-fest (breakfast and lunch), and on those more unlucky days, bunchner (breakfast, lunch, and dinner). We are doing a century with two passes the last day into portland from the coast and we are heading straight to Nicolas' Restaurant where we will estrange all around us in a frenzied glory.

More later and pics are coming soon.....