Mur de Shine

Three quick notes:

• First, a quick thank you to all who have either donated directly to Life with Cancer or who have committed to sponsor my ride. I am truly grateful for your support.

• Today was a rest day; we are staying with our Columbus friends, Emia and Mike, who are finishing a year’s stay in the Seattle area. Emia is a trained nutritionist, which was fortuitous because (after seeing how depleted I looked and felt) she gave me some good dietary and hydration tips, tailored for my age (i.e., someone who is no longer a spring chicken). More proteins, more sugar, and an electrolyte mix that has a sufficient amount of magnesium.

• Finally, yesterday’s route (thankfully) took me off of busy state route 104 before reaching the Hood Canal bridge that connects the Olympic and Kitsap Peninsulas. The route dumped me on Shine Road, which overlooks Squamish Harbor. It is a quiet, two-lane road with houses facing the harbor. “Great,” I thought, “If this road hugs the harbor it will be mostly flat,” which wasn’t far from the truth… for the first mile. And then I see it… a wall of asphalt, only 1/4 mile in length, but still a wall. It looked so steep that it looked as if I would ride smack into it. But Shine Road dipped a little and (too) soon enough I was climbing that Mur (wall). While certainly not as brutal as the famous Mur de Huy, which serves as the final climb of the La Fleche Wallone cycling classic in Belgium, the .Mur de Shine peaks at an 18% grade, an extremely difficult test for this not-so-spring chicken.
  

  The first three days on the Olympic Peninsula were a good warmup for tomorrow, when I climb from near sea level to 2,500 feet over Snoqualmie Pass in the Cascade Mountains.