Over the Divide

Fog is a constant in Brookings, at least when I've been there. Most mornings in the spring and summer it rolls in off the ocean and leaves the coast socked in for miles. Sticks around till noon too. We rolled out into the hazy early and headed south towards the Smith River pass, Redwood Highway. It was a cool 55 degrees, really not bad considering what we'd gone through up north. The road runs over the mountains towards Grant's Pass, and it's all kinds of madcap fun. The cliffs over the river are steep and the road hugs all the curves, so it's awesome on a bike. Except when you get stuck behind a minivan with the creeping horrors of going over 35 on a corner. God bless turnouts and passing lanes, and CDoT for keeping the road in good shape

It was hot over the mountains, and it rolled down the pass. We started in full gear, but once we got into Grant's Pass it was too hot for any of it.

We opted to take a less direct route back to Oklahoma, we're trying to keep out of the southern desert as much as we can. Nonetheless, we still kept a pretty straight path east, one mountain after another. The forests of pine shrank like a film in reverse, the climate growing dryer as we approached the high plains.

There was a pause there at the end of the Cascades. The mountains dropped away behind us and a wall of rock out to either horizon before us, distant at the end of a long valley. For long miles we raced toward the wall but at the last second we turned to the south and climbed along the cliffside, ascending hundreds of feet over the scrubland. We had reached the high desert.

It was like riding through a Western, all mesa, scrub, and rock spires. The air smells like spearmint up there. I don't know which plant it was, maybe some kind of sage, but it was great. Eventually even a sweet-smelling desert begins to drag, and I was happy to call it a day in Winnemucca.