Ryan: the day begins at dawn, and other tales

I'm sitting in a cypress tree, looking out at the ocean. Some old dudes just walked by speaking German, discussing, as far as I can tell, shit. Or maybe my German vocabulary is just too limited. Regardless, I can hear a fog horn blowing in the distance, and I'm not lying, two little brown rabbits just hopped by. It's nice, it's tranquil. It's blogging time.

This is Ryan, by the way, the oft mentioned but seldom heard from member of the cycling duo. I've been trying to coax Ben into writing an action-packed I-hope-you-brought-your-Depends-,-grandma-,-because-this-is-so-damn-exciting-you-are-going-to-wet-yourself blog post, but alas, he has not been obliging. Have no fear, faithful and likely bored-by-the-slow-pace-of-this-page audience of Ben's. (Tired of hyphens? In German that whole sentence would have been one long word.) I am here to add some pizzaz, to tell, nay, show you what it is like on the inside.

A typical day on the road begins either at dawn or, if we have slept outside the tent and a dense fog rolls in and starts misting on our faces at 2:11AM, 2:13AM. At this time, we either notice that we are wet and promptly (and in retrospect, ill-advisedly) fall back asleep or notice that our fellow bicycle campers have already left the campsite to cycle in "daylight," an enigmatic substance of which they speak very highly and we see very little, and promptly fall back asleep. We wake a second time at around noon, and then a final time at approximately 11PM, at which time another set of campers has moved in and gone to sleep. Ben and I emerge for beakfast and light my jet engine powered stove, the sound from which causes several of our fellow campers to lose control of their bowels and a symphony of car alarms to fill the campground. Breakfast consists of outmeal: delicious, healthy, full carbs, just add water. The water, unfortunately, takes roughly six days to boil, as Ben has decided to boil 14,000 gallons of water, even though we only need two cups. Ben doesn't quite have an eye for these things yet.

After beakfast, we clean up camp, by which I mean Ben is somehow magically ready to go instantly, while I spend a year collecting my things from all corners of this and the three previous night's campsites. Once all is collected and mounted on the bike, we get on our bikes to depart. But we don't depart just yet, because we are clatsops*, and we forgot to fill our water bottles/my camelbak. Ok, let's go... wait. I have to pee. Ahhhhhhhh. Ok, let's... wait. Sunscreen/jacket. Finally, we depart.

Ten minutes later we stop for our second meal of the day, which we affectionately (but not too affectionately) call: "second beakfast."

More on that in my next post: "The 10,000 Calorie muffin, or, How I learned to stop worrying and mmmmphmmmmchomp."