Tour de Lavender 2021

“Stop! That’s my bike!”

I ran up the street as the disheveled guy pulling my bike behind his own disappeared around the corner. Dejected, I plopped down on the sidewalk and started to cry.

My bike getting stolen was inevitable. All day I had walked off leaving it and then forgetting where I parked it. As I sat there trying to figure out how I was going to get home, I awoke.

Bloody hell! It was just a dream! Looking at the clock, I saw it was 2 am.

I had taken the ferry to Kingston and settled in at the Comfort Inn in Sequim, planning on getting a good night’s sleep in preparation for my ride in the Tour de Lavender the next day. In spite of the melatonin I took, it was 10 pm before I fell asleep.

I woke from the dream…or rather nightmare…and got up to pee before settling back down. I tossed and turned, reliving the nightmare in my mind. I just couldn’t shut my brain off! It went that way for the next two hours. The last time I looked at the clock, it was 4:10 am.

Too soon, my alarm went off at 6 am. I stumbled out of bed, my head foggy and my ears bleary. Great! How the heck was I going to ride my first metric century (roughly 62 miles) on so little sleep?

After getting dressed and loading up the car, I drove around looking for a place to eat a hearty breakfast. I knew I need to fuel up for the long bike ride ahead of me. The only things open were a few coffee stands and fast food chains. I couldn’t stomach fast food in the morning and wanted more than a bagel or pastry. I pulled up Google and looked for restaurants that served breakfast. I found one, right next to the Comfort Inn, that opened at 7 am. I could want another 20 minutes for it to open, but was annoyed that I wasted gas driving around town.

I ordered chicken fried steak, gravy, hashbrowns and eggs with toast, but couldn’t eat more than the steak and one corner of toast. I just can’t eat very much at one time these days.

Getting into my car, I checked the time and saw it was only 7:30 am…wow, that was quick in the restaurant! I thought it took longer for me to get my food than it really did.

I drove to the event starting place and parked. Before signing in, I saw they had cycling jerseys, t-shirts and mugs for sale. Though I have plenty of short-sleeved jerseys, I bought one from a previous year (and without the date on it) on a whim.

I was able to sign in before 8 am. Once I was done, I was directed to another spot to pick up a free hat and wristband with the event name on it. Now to wait for a new bike friend to join me.

Originally, I was going to camp with her in her RV, but changed my mind and got a hotel room at the last minute. We were to meet up at the event start around 7:30 am, but she was running behind. I gave up waiting by 8:10 am…I was anxious to get on my bike.

I’m glad I started when I did…she did get signed in and started until about 8:40 am. By that time, I already had around 8 miles under my belt.

The first part of the route for the metric century went a couple of miles along the Olympic Discovery Trail (ODT) before turning off onto the road, crossing Hwy 101 and heading up into the highlands of Sequim. My legs felt a little tight at first, but I was soon hitting my stride. My ebike has four pedal assist (PAS) settings and mostly kept it in PAS 1 (the lowest) except for the hills. For those, I used the throttle, while pedaling, to get to the top. It was along one of the roads where I saw three emu in a pen and stopped to photograph them. They were so funny, making weird noises, chasing each other around the pen, and jumping into the air at each other, kicking their feet! I also visited the first lavender farm on the route and had some lemonade and half a tangerine.

Since my accident a month ago, going downhill still frightened me and I rode my brake a lot, keeping my speed under 10 mph. I still have a pea-sized hard knot on my forehead from the crash and didn’t wish to add another to it!
Once out of the highlands, I rode a long a street that paralleled Hwy 101 for several miles before turning under the highway and getting back on the ODT (in the other direction). At Sequim Bay State Park, there was another rest stop with food and drink. I had more lemonade and a pickle. I had brought my own snacks, including pickles, but never had to dig into them since food was so plentiful at the stops.

The route turned back onto the ODT for a few miles, then headed north towards the coast. The part along the coast was chillier with rain drizzle and headwinds. The tide was partially out and I could smell the strong scent of sea air…of things decaying.

To conserve my phone battery, I dimmed my phone screen but my finger slipped and it completely zeroed out the brightness so I couldn’t see a thing. I couldn’t even see enough to try and increased the brightness or to switch to camera to take more photos. To make matters worse, the heavy cloud cover kept causing my GPS to lose its signal. I was recording my ride and when I lose GPS, it short-cuts the recording so it ends up reading lower mileage than it really is.

could feel my mood turning grumpy so I decided to increase my speed to get the second half of the ride over with more quickly. I had been riding an average of 12-13 mph, but now I was riding 18-19 mph.
There were more stops at lavender farms, including Washington Lavender, which is part of the George Washington Inn. I was pissed that I couldn’t see anything on my phone to even try and take pictures there…it was so darn lovely!
I rode the remaining 11+ miles with two guys (on regular bikes) who were matching me in speed. Sometimes they took the lead and sometimes they followed in my draft. I joked that I felt like a horse who sees the barn…we all wanted to get to the finish as quick as possible!

Finally, I see the finish banner and sail through. My time was around 5:40, which I don’t consider too bad for a first time (plus all the hills and rest stops).
They had pizza at the finish, but I could barely eat one slice. I was more thirsty and downed a couple cups of lemonade.
Once in the car, I was pleased that I was finally able to see enough of my phone screen to increase the brightness and turn off my ride recording. As expected, the loss of GPS at times screwed up the distance as well as the time (it had me at 54 miles and 2:51 hours, which is ridiculous).

My bike friend finished about a hour after I did, but we never did see each other.

After grabbing a bite to eat, I headed to Kingston and just missed the 4:40 pm ferry. I had to wait for the 5:30 pm ferry, so I turned on my audiobook to keep me occupied.

I finally got home around 6:15 pm where I unloaded the car, soaked in the tub and was able to reflect on my long ride. I was quite proud of myself…I never dreamed I would be a long distance bike rider!