On Saturday I exchanged my Triple Shot shirt for my BC Randonneur shirt and set off at 6:15am from Maple Ride with five other riders for Monroe WA. After a breakfast stop in Chilliwack (50k) we headed back to the Sumas crossing and rode south to Kendall-Sedro Woolley-Marblemount-Darlington-Arlington-Granite Falls-Monroe (380k). We arrived at 30minutes past midnight and booked in at the Best Western for a 4 hour sleep. Up 4:30 and then to Denny's for a breakfast. We hit the road at 6am and arrived back in Maple Ridge(227K) for a total distance of 607K at 5:37pm for an elapsed time of 35hours:22 minutes. The average speed was 24.7 giving a saddle time of just over 24 hours.
The main highlights of the ride were:
1. Small towns of Washington State fine dinners are Gas station convenience stores. Chocolate milk and plastic wrapped turnovers is the meal of choice!! We did not trust the hot chicken stripes that looked as though they had been under the infra red heat light all day. So breakfast at Denny's on Sunday morning was a real treat and our first real meal.
2. The afternoon temperature on both days reached 27F so we needed copious amounts of water. On Sunday afternoon we were stopping every 25ks at gas stations to refill our water bottles.
3. We suffered no mechanicals or flats - a first for me!
Never again - until the next time.
Mark
Maple Ridge-Marblemount-Monroe 600k
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