Day 14 - July 1, 2001

Cle Elum, WA

Day of Rest
922.14 total trek miles

            We are very grateful to the Eastwood family for taking us in. It isn't easy to let five tightly clad strangers into your home and they have not only done that but made us feel as though part of the family. Much to our delight, the Eastwood's are strictly enforce a non-hunger policy in their home. We can vouch for the validity of that reputation and applaud their success in its execution.

            I don't know what we'd do without Sundays, but with them our bodies, which the day before were at the point of rebelling against us, don't in fact rebel against us. We all got a good night's rest and spent the day doing very little. We went to church and took a nap and ate food. Our needs have become quite simple, though to our hosts it must seem like we have neither eaten nor slept for days. To each family with which we stay, we explain through smiles and chuckles that these eating habits they see are normal for us and that they needn't be alarmed. Certainly the lock they're thinking of putting on the fridge is unnecessary because sleep is the most secure lock on our stomachs. Anyway, a lock on a refrigerator wouldn't stand up against a hungry Dan's genius, just like a phone book couldn't stand between Dan's resolve to rip it and whatever reason he did it for.

            We have fully enjoyed our stay with the Eastwood's, who insist we come back someday. If we do, it probably won't be on bikes, which has both its advantages and disadvantages. The advantages are obvious, I would hope, for they are the same reasons we as a people decided to drive cars instead of ride bikes years ago. Since then, the bike has never threatened the car as America's mode of transportation. The disadvantage is that people aren't nearly as sympathetic to drivers as they are to cyclists for the simple reason that drivers don't do anything in driving deserving of sympathy. Sure, they try to get some by telling how long they've driven and how early they had to get up and how bad the traffic was and how their air-conditioning broke, etcetera. Some people buy those contrived complaints - not many do and certainly not many cyclists do. Biking to someone's house is a much better way to get sympathy because not only can you complain (I like to call it explain) about the hills and the heat and the wind and the distance, but you also receive the added bonus of being thought slightly mentally incompetent for the attempt, which produces oodles of sympathy. Try it sometime. The riding part is a little tough, but you'll enjoy the royal treatment you receive for being thought mentally unable to understand that cars are faster and easier to drive than bikes.