A Very Hot Bike Ride to Yelm and Back

I really wanted to go on a bike ride and Mom just got her new bike so she could get exercise other than walking all the time.  I called her up and asked her if she wanted to go on a bike ride over the weekend and she said sure.  We agreed upon Sunday.  Ben was on a 24 hour shift at the fire department.  We knew it was going to be hot but we didn't know it was actually going to reach 100 degrees that day (which would be the hottest day of the year for us).  I knew I had to replace some of my caches along that part of the trail so I made sure to put a bunch of containers into my back pack so I would have them.

I got up around 9:30 and got ready to go.  I had a small breakfast and then packed up everything into the Escape including the recycle, my bike, replacement caches, water jugs and back packs.  I brought over the last of our pulled pork and beans to share with everyone because Ben and I weren't eating it very fast and we didn't want it to go bad.  I stopped by the recycle on the way to Rainier, dropped it off and made it to Mom and Dad's house around noon.

Doug and Dad were going to spend the afternoon doing garbage today.  I'm glad I didn't have to do that because I went about a month ago on one of my Friday furlough days.  Doug had gotten there before me and Mom decided that we should make some lunch before we started doing our stuff for the day.  I mentioned to her on the way over that I was going to bring leftover pulled pork and beans.  We heated them up and everyone ate some food.

We took Mom's bike out of the trailer in the font yard and managed to stuff it in the back of the Escape with my bike.  We drove into Rainier and parked behind Rainier Market near some shade.  We unloaded the bikes and put the stuff we needed into my back pack.  We got onto our bikes and headed east on the Yelm-Tenino trail towards Yelm and it wasn't quite that hot yet.  We managed to ride all the way to Yelm before we stopped for water.  Most of the trail is covered in trees so we had plenty of shade.

When we did get to Yelm, it was approaching 100 degrees so hardly anyone was on the trail or at the skate park.  I've always wanted to ride by bike on a vacant skate park and today was that perfect day!  It was too hot for everyone else!  I rode up and down some of the ramps and mom took some pictures of me.  It was fun.  

Afterwards, we crossed the main intersection in Yelm and headed down the back roads to the Dollar Tree.  We forgot our bike locks so Mom stood outside waiting for me to bring some cold water and some Twix ice cream bars.  It was nice to stand in line in an air conditioned building for a few minutes. 

We stood outside and ate our ice cream bars and then dumped our cold water into our Nalgene's.  We threw away our garbage and then headed back the same way we came back to the trail to ride back to Rainier.  We saw that the temperature actually reached 100 degrees on the reader board at the bank.

We stopped a few times for water breaks, since it got hotter and I wanted to place two new caches along the trail where there were open gaps.  The first one was Highway 507 and 105th Trail Cache (GC8YF5W) and the second was Curious George (GC8YF5Z).  They were both simple caches hidden just off the trail.  I took the coordinates and wrote down some hints and then asked mom what we should call them.  We came up with those names.  I checked on a few of my older caches as we rode by just to make sure they had a good logbook inside and that the container was actually still there.

After we crossed Manke Road, we took a rest and water break near some rocks in the shade.  We sat on the rocks and took some swigs of water.  We were probably here for about ten minutes or so.  It was nice to take a break.

We got back to the Escape after a 12 mile bike ride, loaded up the bikes and headed towards Tenino to grab the cache at McIntosh Lake, Lake McIntosh CITO Bonus (GC89R6X).  The last time I was here I couldn't find it and then because of Covid the gates to the boat launch were closed until June so I had to wait to come back to get it.  Ohjoy had fixed it by then as well.  We had to go the back way on Military Road to Tenino because someone had T-boned someone by the Vail and Hwy 507 intersection and the road was closed for a while.  We got to the lake and I had to orient myself so it wasn't super obvious because there were a bunch of people parked there getting ready to play in the lake.  I knew exactly where it was, grabbed it, signed our names and put it back quickly.

We drove into Tenino so I could check on my caches there.  All was well thank goodness.  Since we were in Tenino, I stopped by the fire station to say hi to Ben and to find his cache, Tenino FD 12 (GC8N3PM).  It wasn't hard because I was with him when he placed it back in March before Covid closed everything.  I told him we were there and he came out and visited for a bit while I found the cache and signed our names.  He was glad I stopped by but I told him it had to be a short visit because Mom was in the Escape and was hot and wanted to go home.  I gave him some hugs and kisses and told him I would see him when he got home after work the next day.

We drove back to Rainier to Mom and Dad's house.  I filled up my water jugs, Dad and Doug just got done at the dump and pulled up as we were putting Mom's bike back in the trailer.  I was really wanting a sandwich but Meconi's was closed on Sundays so I decided to order one from Jersey Mike's on their phone app.  I have never ordered a sandwich on an app before.  Yay Covid and contactless fast food!  I drove into Lacey, picked up my sandwich and headed home.

The weather did get significantly cooler and rained a tiny bit.  The sunset and sky were pretty colors of oranges and pinks.

I logged my caches, created my new caches, ate my sandwich, watched hockey, talked to Mom and Trish for a bit on the phone and got cleaned up.  I worked on my blog for a bit and then went to bed because I was exhausted from being out in the heat.

Next Adventure:  A Weekend with Trish and Ed