Outside Features

“Sixty is the new forty.” Hillary Clinton made the line famous last year when she celebrated her 60th birthday during the presidential campaign. Woodstock celebrated its 40th anniversary this past weekend and the Joan Baez concert at the Athletic Club on Sunday night was brimming with Bend's Baby Boomers.
It seems like friends have been turning 60 all around me this summer and, if there is any place with an aquifer of youth, it must be Bend, Oregon. The women I know are not wearing black and throwing in the towel. They are celebrating – and I'm not talking about little old lady tea parties.
They grew up and went to school in the pre-Title IX days. (Title IX, now known as the Patsy T. Mink Equal Opportunity in Education Act, became law in 1972.) Dani, who turns 60 in October, recalls, “When I was in school they wouldn't let me take auto mechanics class. They said I would be a distraction. I could take home economics.”

TRAGEDY ON THE RIVER
On a Monday evening two weeks ago, I put in behind the Park & Rec building to paddle upriver and meet a few friends for some whitewater play in the rapids above Bill Healy Bridge. It was 6:30 p.m., about 90 degrees, and the river was choked with floaters. As I began to paddle, I saw a dark colored shirt floating downstream and heard sirens start to wail. People yelled at me from the footbridge, “Look for someone in the water!”
Seventeen-year-old Aaron Garcia had been trying to swim across the river from Farewell Bend Park across the river with friends when he began to struggle and slipped below the surface.

A RIDE WITH VALUE ACT
Last week, in between the Cascade Cycling Classic and the National Road Championships in Bend, I joined the ValueAct women's professional cycling team on an easy reconnaissance ride through Tetherow. We analyzed the hills and the turns, discussing which ones could be taken at full speed in aero bars during the upcoming time trial. While riding, I had a chance to chat with several members of the team.
All of the riders said that the CCC was a really hard race, but the team did well. Bendite Chrissy Ruitter races on the ValueAct squad and placed sixth in the GC in the Cascade Cycling Classic, while Kristin McGrath, from Durango, CO soloed to victory in the final stage in the Awbrey Butte Circuit Race.
“The whole team rode a great race,” commented team director, Lisa Hunt. “I told them they could win it and that's what they did. I'm so proud of all of them! Now that we've had a taste of victory on this course, we're going to try to do it again [at Nationals], but they might not let one of the girls go at the exact spot!”

Surf- Skiing Paulina LakeThe heat is on. It's supposed to be close to 100 degrees all week long.
I feel for the cyclists in the Cascade Cycling Classic last week and
the National Championships this week. As if the elevation, the hills
and the competition weren't tough enough, you know it's a scorcher when
you can see the heat waves shimmering off the black asphalt and hear
the tiny tar bubbles going off like Jiffy Pop under your wheels. As
much as I love the bike, the water is the place to be right now. The
only dilemma is which water toy to pull out of the quiver.

SEA KAYAK
If I could only have one boat (heaven forbid), I'd
pick my sea kayak, because of its versatility. My 17-foot 6-inch
Wilderness Systems Shanai is a fast daytripper perfect for a paddle and
picnic on any lake (and now is absolutely the time for that). It's fast
enough that it's in demand every year for PPP, but it can also take me
on a weeklong expedition in the San Juans or Canada.

Breaking away, Central Oregon style, at the CCC.For bike lovers, this is sensory overload season. The wildflowers are ablaze along Sector 16, there is a century ride to choose any weekend, and the Central Oregon Crit Series (www.centraloregonracing.com) is in full swing on Wednesday nights in Northwest Crossing…and it only gets worse.

TOUR DES CHUTES
The fifth-annual Tour Deschutes was a huge, hot hit on Saturday with over 1,000 people riding to raise awareness and money for the Lance Armstrong Foundation and the St. Charles Cancer Survivorship Program. "At the finish line, cancer survivors go through a special chute and receive a yellow rose. It was amazing to see how many people went through that chute and the community support for (event founder) Gary Bonacker and the event," said 45-mile ride participant Suzie Miller. "My Dad died of lung cancer from all the smog in Southern California and I have a picture of us riding together on my bike. Whenever the going gets tough, I ask Dad to help me kick it in."

An umbrella drink vacation, Idaho style.When I got invited on a trip down the Middle Fork of the Salmon River, I had no idea how lucky I was. My friends had been trying for 12 years to score a permit. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time. Which, I've learned, is the secret to running rivers, racing bikes…and much of life.

MIDDLE FORK
The put-in for the 99-mile, six-day Middle Fork trip is at the Boundary Creek Campground in the River of No Return Wilderness in Idaho, about a nine-hour drive from Bend. Like water evaporating and returning to a river as snowmelt, sometimes people recirculate in our lives. At the put-in, I was reunited with my roommate from grad school in the '80s, Carol Cady, who now lives in Missoula. Carol was an Olympic discus thrower in '84 and '88 who went on to earn an M.D./PhD. Anything Carol decides to do, she excels at. She turned her focus to whitewater kayaking about 15 years ago, so I felt pretty good following her down the river.

At home on the RogueFarewell Eddy

Like so many in the local outdoor community, I was saddened when Eddy Miller lost his life two weeks ago during a hike after a day of rafting on the Middle Fork of Idaho's Salmon River. Saddening because even though I wasn't a close personal friend of his, I was looking forward to getting to know him better after spending four days with him on the Rogue River in May.
During our Rogue trip, Miller lived up to his well-deserved reputation as a consummate rafter and outdoorsman. Standing, as he liked to, while rowing invoked old school rafting at its best. But he was on the river for more than just for the rowing and whitewater. Miller reveled in the natural surroundings. And after a day on the river, he proved a model of efficiency in getting the night's camp up and running smoothly.
He looked the part of the outdoorsman, his wiry, tan, well-muscled body set off by a shock of pre-mature white hair.
As the trip unfolded, he revealed his family's unique connection the Rogue. It's detailed in his grandmother's diary, a copy of which he gave me, chronicling a four-month long Miller family stay on the river in 1929. It proved a fascinating read.