30.0 miles/ +771.0 ft/ Total miles 3237.3
I lost more elevation today, so I will have more to gain back on the ride over Loup Loup Pass tomorrow. Too bad.
Each one of the passes has a high side and a low side. I got the low side on Sherman Pass, the high side on Wauconda, and now I will have the low side for Loup Loup. Okanogan is at elevation 840 ft, the top of the pass is at 4020 ft, and Twisp (on the other side) is at 1637 ft. For Washington and Rainy passes, I will have the high side (but steeper) climb up Washington (5477 ft) from Mazama at 2106 ft. I can’t imagine how the west-to-east riders do the ride up Rainy Pass (4855 ft) from Newhalem (elevation 515 ft) on Day 4 of their Northern Tier trip. It certainly can not be much fun!
On the early morning ride today, I had beautiful views of the Okanogan valley. The landscape is so big, it is difficult to capture in pictures. I really like the various colors found in the fields, mountains, and valleys.
Amazing rock formations on the mountainsides:
Where there is irrigation, there is some green:
And I found more bicycle art in the small town of Riverside
By happenstance, I had a message yesterday from the Australian cyclists I met a couple of weeks ago in Whitefish, and it turns out they are in Omak this weekend (waiting for new bike shoes to arrive via FedEx). So we met for coffee (and I had second breakfast) in Omak and caught up on travels since Whitefish. I’m looking forward to seeing them again in Seattle in a few weeks.
Judy's Bike Ride 2017 
Just a heads up that there are forest fires generating smoke. A friend just posted this to FB, so I thought I would share here. “Forest fires are blazing not far from our home in Mazama. No one is in any danger right now unless you need to breathe. The chart here (Sorry, no source given–it was an air quality chart) indicates that the smoke level is dangerous for everyone. Since I have respiratory issues, I headed to Seattle today.” When we rode the other direction, we crested Washington pass heading for what we thought would be a cooling fog–It was smoke! I wish I had used some sort of protection. So here is a heads up in case you want to locate a face mask or something.
Great bicycle art – looks like it would be dynamic in a wind! How neat to have the overlap with the Australians and be able to compare notes. I was thinking about how you can talk to the west to east people because you see each other in passing, but the other east to west riders are hard to connect with because you’re all going in the same direction. Nice that Fedex hadn’t delivered their shoes yet! Sounds like a big day going over Loup Loup Pass – getting to Twisp will be good (Twisp? really? love it!) Have a good ride.
Yikes – take care with the fires and smoke…