62 miles, 1,800' of elevation gain, 48 - 76 degrees under bright sunny skies
The weather broke and we had beautiful sunny skies for the entire day. I woke early and when I couldn't fall back to sleep, I decided to get on the rode and make my way to the resort town of Coeur d'Alene. The route was well planned out by Gary and Rita to keep us off any major highways except for one short stretch on US95 but that had a good shoulder. We rode over the river using an old bridge that was now dedicated to cyclists and pedestrians and enjoyed the views all around without having to watch for traffic and such.
Once we left the Sandpoint area, we were on quiet back roads with Bald Eagles and Osprey nests with young Osprey poking their heads out of the nests. Deer also were a common sighting along with more mountain ranges. Since I left before the breakfast service started in Sandpoint, I did stop at a local cafe and visited with the waitstaff and had a somewhat delayed breakfast.
I arrived in Coeur d'Alene by 1:00 and Dion had just gotten our room so we were able to deposit luggage and bike and go to the famous dessert bar located within the Coeur d'Alene Resort. We probably should have shared but we didn't and it counted as lunch for us. After a quick shower, we went up in a float plane and were treated to spectacular views of not only the lake, but the rivers and mountains that make up the area. With such a beautiful day it was the best afternoon activity we could have done.
We were treated to a wine cellar tour of the resort by Eric the Sommelier. Their collection is about 15,000 bottles and with a glass of wine in hand we were able to view not only all of the collection but how the wine is organized and the temperature controls used to preserve the wine.
The group had its last dinner at Beverly's, the signature restaurant of the Coeur d'Alene Resort and the food, wine and views were a special way of spending the last night as a group.
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