Day 5

Day 5

May 31 2017

Made it from Lewiston to Orofino.

God and I had a long talk about possessions and how to use them.

It was a revealing and marked conversation.

Went through a construction zone.

Had to have the bike hauled for three miles in the back of a pickup.

Able to give a card to the lady driver and tell her briefly about this ride for missions.

Let me back up here a tad.

I was told that I should not take Hwy. 12 due to the amount of construction.

And the large number of logging trucks, rock trucks, and most any type of large semi you can think of.

Sure there were all those.

I was told the shoulder would be inadequate to use.

Nope.

My take on Hwy. 12.

Twenty some miles of beautifully wondrous creation.

Well worth it.

And to ride on freshly paved road without all the divots, holes and weatheted cracks was a delight.

And the truckers?

There were quite a few.

Not as many as I thought there would be.

The two rear view mirrors have been absolutely invaluable.

Not only do I see the vehicles before they get to close, I have the opportunity to "troim we han", slow down and move to the shoulder.

Which was always wide enough.

And of course, you most always can hear the trucks.

Lenore Rest Area is right on the river.

A beautiful place to sit and reflect on the goodness of God.

That is where I was told about the Orifino Community Church.

Thought I may be able to make a connection for the night.

Did not work out.

However, while I was gobbling up all the shade at the local Harvest Food store, I struck up a nice conversation with a man.

He said there was a place on the other side of the river where some people camp.

That too, did not work out.

Often times one may camp in the city park.

Guess what?

No overnight camping.

I seriously thought about chancing it.

Looking around at the sky there were quite a few dark clouds forming.

That was at seven this evening.

I rode a couple miles out from Orofino.

I am now, one hour later, comfortably in my tent, in a field, several hundred feet from the highway.

Pushed myself right up against a tree so hope not too many people see me.

The tent rain fly is a dark green so that helps.

When I first pulled into the church parking lot and under the covering of the shade of its drop off area, I was there but a few minutes and a guy pulls up.

We started talking about recumbents.

He has done some touring on bike as well.

And he has fashioned his own recumbents!

Gave him a card and hope he will email me.

He had quite a lot of information to share.

Told me of two books I should read.

I have heard of both of them.

Just never read them yet.

They will certainly go on my list.

John Francis

Planet Walker

In the Kindness of Strangers

Mark Mcintyre

Must say that one gets a lot of time to think when riding a trip like this.

As much as I feel I am hungry, and I know I need food to keep going, it amazes me what I have eaten on this trip so far.

Basically one meal a day.

Lots of water.

Think I am finally finding that "groove" for this ride.

Well, now that all the trivial matter is out of the way....

I want to apologize for what I said about being out of money in my previous post.

I did not mean to imply that I wanted anyone to give to help me.

I certainly did not get the correct message across.

I apologize.

Since I am unable to access PayPal online, no signal out here, if anyone contributed to that account it will all go to missions.

Should you desire to help me personally with food, bike parts, etc., let me know.

It blows my mind how easily we want to give, yet how difficult it is for us to recieve.

That will always be a hard one for me.

Yes, I did not have any more money in my bank account.

The marvelous part is that even without people have helped and encouraged.

God has proven consistently on this ride His faithfulness.

The gentleman today was going to give me a ride to that campsite on the other side of the river.

Asked me of it would violate my mission.

Certainly not!

So here I am.

I am around one hundred fifty miles from Missoula.

Three days?

I know not.

The one truth I do know.

God has been with me every crank of the pedals.

Good night all!

D.