North Cascade Day Ride

I got in a nice ride Saturday. Susan was sick but the weather was nice so I left her home in bed and went north on I5 to the North Cascade Highway (WA 20) and headed east. Just east of Mount Vernon I took a road that paralleled 20, the South Skagit Road. It goes along the south side of the Skagit River. It follows the river real close. I could see it most of the time when the trees weren't too thick. Nice road with very little traffic. That was over 20 miles I think. Then I crossed the river into Concrete. That's a town on highway 20 and I had lunch at Cascade Burgers. It was very good. I had a buffalo burger and onion rings. It's a place worth stopping at. I made a way point on my GPS so I could find it again. Not that it would be difficult. It's on the main road on the edge of town. I then continued east to Rockport and then to Marble Mount. There is a very good restaurant there called the Buffalo Run. You can get Elk burgers and steaks there. Susan and I ate lunch there the year before last on one of our three day trips. I made another way point because we are planning a Cascade loop ride for the last weekend in June and plan to have lunch there again. The stretch of highway 20 between Rockport and Marble Mount is really nice. Very good surface and nice curves, not tight ones those are further up toward the pass but it was still really nice to ride.

I gassed up and headed back to Rockport where I turned south to Darrington. That's a nice stretch of road also. It follows one of the branches of the river. At Darrington I took highway 530 west to I5 then on home. 530 is a good road but not a destination in itself like the cascade highway is. Except where the tree were thick I could see snow on the peaks and wild flowers starting to Bloom. The traffic was light most of the day until I got closer to Seattle on I5 but then I5 is not a good motorcycle road, just a means to get out of town.

I didn't take the camera so no picture to show. But if you look at our blog entries of 08 you should be able to find the ones we took then. I think the whole trip was some where over 200 miles. Really a nice day ride.

The weather next Saturday is promising to be just as nice. Of course who believes the weatherman's promises? We can only hope. Maybe Sue will be well enough then so we can both ride. We've got to get some training in before the big one in August.