Day 9: Coos Bay to Gold Beach, OR

August 8: Coos Bay to Gold Beach, OR

80 miles, yy mph

We had been worried that we'd hit rain leaving Coos Bay, but the force was with us. It was foggy, as usual, but there was a lightness in the sky that suggested we might actually see the sun. The route suggested by "the book" (the West Coast biking book, which we have been loosely following as a guide) actually routed us an additional 8 miles taking us off of US101 and directing us along some local streets so that we could admire the fog off the shore, before rejoining the highway. That would have made the ride 88 miles instead of 80. At this point, we were pretty well past choosing the scenic route over the direct route, so we opted for 101 out of the city.

We cruised through the first 25 miles or so before breaking for coffee at the little town of Bandon. We normally stop at the first coffee shop we see as we enter a city--which is what we did, here. But, as we left Bandon we noticed that the town actually had a lot of personality. It had an old town section that looked pretty interesting.

The cool thing about our ride on this day was that we had sun, flat roads or gently rolling hills, and it finally started to feel like what I imagined summer on the Oregon coast was actually supposed to look like. We were cruising for our first 50 miles, averaging 16.3 mph and only pushing a little bit to hit that speed. We lunched in the town of Port Orford at a no-name cafe (it's not that I didn't remember the name, the restaurant didn't have one posted) and got an excellent BLT.

They say all good deeds must be punished, and I'm sure there's an analog for bike rides that you really enjoy. Our post-lunch ride was bruising. Shortly after leaving Port Orford, we noticed a sign that stated, "High winds next 27 miles when flashing." We were relieved to see that the lights on the sign were not flashing. My guess is that they were out. And... hmmm our destination was just over 27 miles away.

As easy and pleasant as our morning seemed, our afternoon was at least 2x as unpleasant. Before hitting Port Orford, US101 was located inland, a mile or two from the Pacific. At Port Orford the highway rejoins the ocean follows it closely before shifting inland at Humbug Mountain. The wind was brutal and we started to lose our sun, as well. Mike Green, who likes bombing down the hills noted that he could only hit about 10 mph descending the road around Humbug Mountain because of the intensity of the wind.

After the ascents and descents around Humbug Mountain, the road rejoined the ocean and the wind--which at times had abated around parts of the mountain--became relentless. The afternoon wind along the Pacific coast is supposed to run north-to-south. Apparently this wind hadn't read the same books we had. We finally crossed the bridge at the Rogue River and entered Gold Beach. We were beat.

While we did have to haul our bikes to second floor rooms at the Gold Beach Inn, that sacrifice was totally worthwhile, as the Inn had an excellent set of hot tubs. I think we made it to about 8:15 PM before collapsing and falling asleep.