More photos

"I've got a ride to put on the calendar," Nicky exclaimed over the phone.

I should have known when I saw the Sunday Morning Tribune describing new wine cellars on the Palouse.

Sure enough, Nicky proposed a wine tour starting in Uniontown, riding to Pullman for lunch, a visit at a winery right in town and still another on the Moscow-Pullman highway.

But that was when the weather was cool. Coming off 100 degree days, a ride starting at 10 seemed kind of late when we really got down to it. Still I've been fighting a cold and wasn't sure I'd be able to do more than the 40 or 50 miles I expected the wine tour to become.

Okay, I'll do it. Linda and I arrived in Uniontown early but Nicky was already there. Doug Goodenough had started at the Rose Garden and sat happily on the park bench waiting for the rest of us to get it together. Tamra and Rory were ready to go when Sherrie Kole arrived. Debbie and Camile were going to ride out from Pullman to meet us. We were going to have quite a group and we didn't even know that Dean would show up, crutches and all, for lunch at Basilios.

And the temperature was fine. When we left Uniontown it was in the mid 70s and we had a light breeze out of the west to keep us cool.

We had lots of time. Nicky planned two hours for the ride to Pullman and so arriving early we stopped at B&L. I spent a bit longer there than everyone else as the mechanic identified the source of the creek in my Pilot. They had done the usual on Friday and I had just picked it up but I didn't like the tick and creak I still had.

I caught up with the group at Basilios in time to order. And that's when things began to go bad. Nicky's insulin pump was giving her cryptic messages and was wanting to phone home. Her blood sugar was high. Nicky lost interest in lunch and wine.

Actually Camille had started her first club ride of the year with a flat tire which Debbie helped her fix. We pumped up a bit more at B&L but when we headed for the first winery in the Old Post Office,

Debbie, Camille, and Sherry were no where around. That front tire was flat again--pinched, I guess. By the time we got there the ladies had the tire all changed.

But Dean had taken Nicky back to her car in Uniontown. We were leaderless. We didn't know how to get to the second planned winery. I thought we could ask at the first, but that didn't turn out so well either. Someone was getting married in our Winery!

So, no, we didn't get a taste of wine. Rory did have a beer at lunch. It didn't seem to hold him up as he and Tamra just kept pulling away. We thought we had lost Sherry which stopped us for few minutes.

The weather was comfortable all the way back to Uniontown. I was feeling good and decided to ride on back with Doug. We felt the heat just as we merged back on to 95. The west wind tried to pull us off our bikes descending the grade.