Free & Fresh Salmon!

August 31st

0 miles

Woke up this morning and it was still drizzling. Once again, we were not able to see the supposed lush scenery that surrounds us. This made John and I come to a conclusion that we should stay where we know we will be dry (under the shelter).

What started out as a poor looking day has turned into a truly delightful one. John and I were sitting under the covered pavilion when a guy from Texas, Ron Daniels, walked into our lives. We talked for a bit & exchanged the necessary unimportant things like where we were from & such. We made some tea and chatted some more. Then Mr. Brown asked if we would like to eat fresh salmon for lunch. Of course neither John nor I could possibly muster up a "NO" for an answer. He told us to get a fire going & he would be back in 1/2 hour with fresh fish.

In about 25 minutes he came back with a bag full of fresh salmon fillets. He sat down at our table & mixed the salmon with about 1/2 of the volume of each of our spices; garlic powder, minced onion and pepper. Then he threw them in the MSR frying pan with butter & oil. Wa-La...Fresh salmon!

I can honesty say that he may have ruined our trip because all I can think about is fresh salmon. I really wish we had brought a fishing rod.

Well as we got to know him a little better, it turned out that he was a professional sport fisherman who has competed in bass tournaments for the last 18 years. All I know is that John and I had watched several fisherman over the last few days. Everyone of them got skunked. In less than 30 minutes he had fish in a bag. Damn he was good & so was lunch.

After John and I de-salmonized everything we own, we sat back down & decided to write more postcards and letters. I'm pretty burned out so I'm going to call it quits for a while.

As anyone who has ever caught and eaten fish within 30 minutes of hook to pan knows, fresh fish rocks. Now also imagine eating mostly like crap for the last week and half. Now throw in hard pedaling efforts and riding in the rain for the last few days and you can probably imagine how good fresh fish tasted.

One note that puzzles me is that I have two names for this guy in my journal. Ron Daniels and Mr. Brown. I did a brief search for both names trying to link them to fishing and couldn't find either. I figure it doesn't really matter. He brought us fresh, free salmon.

As usual, I was pretty worked up about not riding. This was a bike tour after all. However, looking back on it now I think I learned two things from this day.

1) This isn't a bike tour any longer. It is an adventure trip. If we don't get the miles in, it's because we are doing something else.

2) If you don't rest every now and then, you might miss things. Had we pushed on in the rain today, we never would have had our free, fresh salmon.

As I read my journal, page through my pictures, and look back through my memories, these two things could not be more true. Throughout this trip (and in life), we meet so many interesting individuals that really define our adventure trip(s) and impact our lives.