Saturday 15^th May, Best Western Hotel, Orofino, Idaho

14.00

Yesterday

We left Lolo Hot Springs at 07.15, with an 84 mile day ahead of us and nowhere to stop en route. The cafe wasn’t open till 8.30 so breakfast was a cup of oatmeal and one of the ham and cheese sandwiches they had made up for us the night before.

We had to climb to 5250 feet very quickly but it was a 6 or 7% rise and we can handle this fairly easily now. At the top we crossed the Continental Divide for the last time as we crossed over into Idaho. We also put our watches back one hour to be on Pacific time another sign that the end is almost in sight.

The rest of the day was spent cycling for almost 80 miles alongside the Lochsa river in a huge pine-clad valley . I can’t think of anywhere in England where you could do the equivalent. Maybe in Scotland perhaps. It was flat or downhill almost the whole way and our average speed was about 13.9 mph which, for us, is about as good as it gets. Lunch was the second ham and cheese sandwich and a Danish pastry, eaten by the river’s edge. This was going well until a colony of wasps decided they wanted a share and we had to move on fairly quickly.

We have handle-bar bags on our bikes and these are really useful for carrying food and money etc. They have plastic flaps on the top and Mike uses his for the map by which we navigate. Mine has been empty until recently when I discovered you can just fit the Guardian Crossword into it and this now is a real help when toiling up hills (or when the scenery hasn’t changed for an hour or two). I wouldn’t advise it going downhill though. It wouldn’t look very good on an accident report. “Crazy bastard was doing nearly 50 and trying to fill in a damn crossword puzzle. Beard full of cake crumbs, too”

We got to Lowell at 2.10 (3.10 before the time change). Very good going. We stopped at the Three Rivers Resort , another log cabin tourist place like Lolo Hot Springs but this one a bit more upmarket. Lowell actually is a tiny place only populated by the store and motel owners and they cater for (pretty well to do) weekend back to nature types.

Our log cabin was a cleverly designed A-Frame set-up which allowed two floors in a very small space. Very neat and pretty comfortable.

Dinner was in the general store/restaurant. Rack of ribs again. A huge pork xylophone covered in red paint. Quite tasty, but, if I’m honest, a bit gross. No red wine so we drank Chablis served from something that looked like a huge specimen jar.

On the way back to the cabin we were surrounded by crowds of people unpacking their SUVs for the weekend break. Some were putting up tents, some gathering wood for their barbecues, others playing frisbee. Me? For some reason I’d never been so homesick in my entire life.

Today

A much easier day today. Still along a river, the Clearwater now, and still mainly downhill. Our scheduled day was over 90 miles which, after yesterday, is too much. So we’ve broken it into two and are stopping here at Orofino a pretty little riverside town , 55 miles from Lowell. We will go 40 miles to Lewiston tomorrow. We will make the time up by doubling up two short days later in the week. Lunch in the Ponderosa, (nothing to do with Bonanza, unfortunately) then into this hotel where our room looks out over river. It's a relief to be surrounded by proper brick walls – I never want to see another log cabin as long as I live.