Day 5: "Ocean in view! O! The Joy!"

Day 5: Winlock, WA to Astoria, OR. 85.5 miles, 4,453 ft. of climbing (137.6 km, 1,357 m; alternate from Winlock rejoining route in Castle Rock was about 20 miles.  Includes the roughly 1.25 miles on the Cathlamet ferry.)
This day had some scenic highlights, but also was a challenge.  The early part of the ride, before I rejoined the Adventure Cycling route, was through a rural area on a grey, foggy Sunday morning.  I had my only dog encounters of the entire tour, on two different occasions with snarling, angry dogs that looked as if they had been bred (or inbred) as attack dogs.  Rather than a normal dog coming out of a normal house or farmstead stimulated by the dog "chase response", instead, these mean-looking dogs came from homesteads each comprised of compounds of several rambling, ramshackle buildings, which gave me the impression the dogs were guarding meth-making operations.   I got past the dogs, and after pedaling more miles that morning, I greeted the Columbia River and headed westward.  The first twenty miles to Cathlamet have a minimal shoulder, so I put my hands in the drops and hammered through it.  At Cathlamet, realizing I had mis-timed getting to the ferry that crosses the Columbia River from Washington to Oregon, I lingered at the grocery store with my lunch until near the time of the next ferry, and then I pedaled the last few miles from Cathlamet to the ferry.  Once across the Columbia into Oregon, the ride into Astoria featured a series of forested climbs on the rather busy Hwy 30.   Being caught off guard by the relatively tough climbs on Hwy 30 dampened my enthusiasm for this particular day, but I suppose, like Lewis and Clark some 200 years before, there was a sense of satisfaction in reaching Astoria and the Pacific Ocean.
 

Resting alongside the Columbia River.