Back in the USA

These rafts of lumber carried on along the river, sometimes one side, sometimes both, for at least 7km - probably further but we turned off!

Tell me this isn't the coolest drive through espresso shack in all of America!

The official Adventure Cycling route back south has definitely been better than the one we chose north, although not completely without awkward bits. A few turns way to tight for my tandem piloting skills and one steep gravelly bit that was hard even pushing the bike. We also had to renegotiate the fairly narrow path alongside the suspension bridge across the Frazer River (this is a steel shelf with retaining fence bolted to the side of the bridge structure – clearly an after thought) A couple of people came the other way while we were on it – thankfully they cowered against the side to let us pass.

The route through the suburbs was quite reasonable – not the nicest road but it had a shoulder for bikes and we were able to keep up a decent pace.

At the border I scoured the signage for mention of a tandem (or bike) lane. We are not a bus, a truck (even with two panniers) or Nexus (I’m not even sure what that is but it must be an exclusive club because only a privileged few take that lane!). We opted for ‘passenger vehicle’, even if that did mean riding three lanes out on a four lane road. While we were sat in the car queue inhaling a lifetime supply of particulates someone shouted across that we would be better taking the ‘walk through’. Eventually we found it and left the tandem leaning against a post outside while we were ‘processed’. Steve asked a valid and pertinent question – where did the other  people doing the walk through come from, as everyone knows no-one walks anywhere in the US? One of life’s imponderables! Anyhow, they let us back in, otherwise our plans would have been curtailed somewhat! A few people have asked us where we are going, to which the answer can only be ‘Mexico’ (although we won’t actually cross the border, but let’s not let technicalities spoil the story).

After the border it was a similar route to yesterday’s – some nice bay views, farmland, woods, a couple of refineries – the kind of roads tandems are built for. 105km has brought us back to Bellingham. We are staying across the road from the motel we were in two nights ago!  We must look dodgy because they made us pay $100 extra in case of damage – in the morning we have to fetch the lady and, as long as the tandem hasn’t dripped oil on the carpet we will get our $100 back!

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