Season 4 Episode 2. Visits to the Principal’s Office as Useful Training

Season 4 Episode 2. Visits to the Principal’s Office as Useful Training – 

7/22/24.

As we went into our tiny, two-person tent last night, we thought about and discussed our predicament. As I last wrote, we had no idea how long State Road 20 would be shut down and we had 3 meals worth of food and it was 12 miles ride back to a general store. (And this store had very little. It was more like a 7-11, not a supermarket.) The park rangers John and Debbie had told us they assemble by the campground office around 9:30am and we could have an update then. Neither of us are the type who like to wait for things to happen and both like to tackle a problem proactively. We didn’t want to wait until 9:30am.

We decided we’d head back 4 miles early morning to a spot where we were told there is WIFI and that would allow us to tell our kids what’s happening and that we are completely safe, but might be off the grid and off cells another day or two until we figure things out. And it would allow us to look for updates before the rangers met us. If by chance the road opens, we wanted to get going super early as it would take us 2.5 hours to pedal up the climb to where the closure was, and we would want to strike fast as it could close again.

On the optimistic side, I knew there must be very strong lobbying by the logging industry and other commercial interests to open the road. As well it was a vital route for tourism which has a limited summer seasonal window here in the northern Cascades. I was hoping this financial pressure would work in our favor.

We went to bed be with uncertainty, and somehow I fell asleep while it was still light out and slept 10 hours. Heather had a poor night’s sleep which was not helpful for the long day ahead.

When we awoke today, we headed back west 4 miles to Diablo Dam, and had a fun ride over the dam. We found the place the rangers told us had WIFi, but it was closed. But we found we had cell service on the dam. Good enough. There was no update online on the road closure. We rode back east to our campground, and could tell by the traffic, or rather absence of traffic coming from the east towards us, that the road was still closed.

We chatted with the rangers at 9:30am, and they had no news and admitted they get info slowly. Debbie, one of the rangers, had a few days off coming up and was driving west on SR 20 leaving at 4:30pm today. She offered to drive us and our bikes in her van back to Concrete or even further if we wanted. We were grateful for that offer, but weren’t ready to give up on getting through to the East.

We decided on a bold move. We would pack up our campsite and ride up the mountain 20 or so miles and about 3000’ of climb, to the closure to try and talk with people onsite and find out what’s going on or likely to happen. Is it likely a day or a week? Or we would even see if we could manage to get through as being on site there was a chance that a kind firefighter would help transport us across the 10 miles closed to traffic.

And if we were denied, it meant riding back down the mountain to set up our tent and camp again. The downside was our time, effort at riding and having to pack up our tent and possibly just setting it up again.

It was a tough, steep ride up and we arrived at the closure.

Closed as expected but there was nobody there to talk with to get info or plea with. If this looks familiar that’s because we faced a similar sign back at Big Sur in 2023.

Flashback to Big Sur, see Season 3, episode 15

What to do? We didn’t come this far to turn back now. But unlike Big Sur where we had advance intel, here we had no guidance or plan. We had to consider the risks of fire and smoke which led us to think about friends who were trapped in Napa Valley surrounded by fires some years ago and phoned their sons to say “goodbye, we love you” before a helicopter magically appeared and landed to save them. It also crossed my mind that we could get fined.

We were not the only ones to come up here out of curiosity or to see what’s going on. But all others were driving so it was an easy turn around for them. We were the only cyclists. We talked with a nice couple G and B from Cincinnati and their adult son T who just graduated from Fordham not far from our home. They generously refilled our water bottles from their water jug in their car. We discussed the merits of us riding beyond the sign. For better or worse, G said to Heather it’s easier to get forgiveness than permission. Oh no! That’s all Heather needs to hear. She’s been living that way with me for over 30 years.

So off we rode beyond the closure line. For 3 quiet miles, we pedaled and saw nobody nor any smoke. And then we met somebody. I took the initiative and said “hi, we are so happy to see you, we were hoping to find somebody to talk with”. I explained our ride, fundraising for the Reeve Foundation and trying to see what’s going on. He could not have been any nicer. We learned of his hikes on the Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail and Continental Divide Trail. He was much younger than us, but a kindred soul. We talked of “trail angels” and the kindness of strangers. He said the fire is not actually on the road and it should be no problem for us to go or one of them to take us the remaining 7 miles in a truck once he checked no trees were across the road. Wow! This was much easier than we hoped.

And then he asked on the radio if it’s okay to send two cyclist through. And we could hear the reply back on the radio of an angry voice saying send them back. Shoot!

Our new friend and angel (name deliberately omitted) told us still that we could wait there with him for a few hours and he would drive us across when his shift ended. And so we hung out thrilled at this good fortune but I wasn’t yet convinced we had this.

After 15 minutes of hanging out and more hiking and biking talk, the boss and another man drove to us.

To get to the point, the boss threatened to have us arrested if we tried to go across. He was so angry that we rode past the road closed sign that he could not consider allowing us through. Under no circumstances would he allow us. He said we had a choice: to go ahead and be escorted away by law enforcement, or go back.

Now I confess for a brief second when he said we had a choice and he threatened arrest, I wondered to myself how much the fine would be and if they would take us to a police station on the other side of the closure. Given being turned away would cost us hundreds of extra miles plus 2-3 days expenses, it could make sense to pay the fine if it got us to the town of Mazama on the other side of the closure.

But I knew better than to ask that. My years of youthful visits to the school Principal’s office was now serving a purpose. Not only could I get in trouble,  I knew the key was to defuse this situation. A win for us was no longer  the goal of getting across, a win would be that we get to go backwards as free cyclists.

And that we did!

But from our conversation with the boss, we did get a key nugget of information. Our goal was to get across or find out how long the closure would be. He told us it would be at least 4 days, and could be a month. So we pedaled back down the mountain and decided we would not wait it out. We passed the Colonial Creek Campground, and continued back to Newhalem where the general store was and another campground. And even though it had been a long, hard day, was getting cold and windy, we decided we would ride another hour as it meant staying indoors with an AirBnB room in a house we found further west in Marblemount. Lucky us to end up indoors.

(Heather’s account would elaborate on how hard the winds were- recall the severe sidewinds sign of yesterday.)

And we arrived at 8:45 pm while it was still light out and just before the restaurant closed where we ate lunch at yesterday, so I got another of their grilled salmon salads.

We had gotten so close to getting through the closure. We could be upset or angry but we weren’t. We understood the fire fighter boss’s responsibility. And we thought of and discussed exactly why we ride for the Reeve Foundation and what we find inspiring in our friends Lenny and Ernie - their positivity in the face of adversity!

Riding across Diablo Dam.

7/22/24 Ride west then east then west.

Copyright Mark Segal 2024.