I did the Get There Challenge for ten days and this is what happened
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By Cole Goodwin
If I’ve learned anything from this year’s Get There Challenge, it’s that getting anywhere in the Gorge…truly is a challenge. But luckily there’s plenty of friendly faces that are willing to help you along the way.
Last year I wrote a story about locals who participated in the Get There Challenge, a thirteen day event in which people are challenged to carpool, use public transit, ride their bike, walk, or engage in remote work instead of driving to work solo. Participants log their walking, biking, transit, and remote working trips online to earn points and unlock achievements for a chance to win prizes.
This year I decided to take part in the event, and boy did I learn a thing or two about getting around the gorge.
Over the course of ten days I logged 59 non-single occupancy vehicle trips
I carpooled 354.6 miles, biked 52.8 miles, remote worked for 52.2 miles and walked the rest, saving nearly 233.3 lbs of carbon from being released into the atmosphere, burning 2,850 calories, and saving $197.62.
I saved $197.62 in just ten days! That means if I did this all the time I’d save $7,213.13 a year! And I can definitely think of things I would rather spend $7k on than putting it in my car and burning it.
According to CarbonVisuals.com this is what 1 lb of CO2 gas looks like, so just imagine 233 of these and that’s how much carbon I saved from being emitted into the air.
And this is what the CO2 produced by one gallon of gas looks like…it’s basically bigger than my entire body. Photo Credit: CarbonVisuals.com
Here’s how it went.
On Monday October 3rd, I awoke at 7 a.m. to the unwelcome sound of my morning alarm going off two hours earlier than I’m used to. I groaned and as I laid in bed contemplating my life decisions… I fell asleep.
Soooo tired.
I awoke twenty minutes later in a panic.
Throwing on some clothes and giving myself a cursory look in the mirror I looked at my phone. My rideshare had arrived and luckily I’d only kept her waiting a few minutes.
I ran down the stairs and promptly realized I’d forgotten my keys. So I ran back up the stairs. Then I ran back down, and then up again and then back down.
This went on for a while.
Finally I walked out the front door at 7:50.
I grabbed my bike and headed over the blue minivan that was waiting for me.
Meeting Jill in person for the first time was nice.
She helped me throw my bike in the back of her car and on the way to work we chatted a bit, although I barely remember what we spoke of thanks to my half-asleep brain.
On our way!
I told her she could drive us straight to her work and I’d bike across town to CCCNews.
Riding my bike through my hometown allowed me to see once familiar places in a totally different way. Where once I was dissociated from my surroundings, now I was immersed in them. Where once I saw just streets, now I saw their shoulders. Now I felt their texture. Where once I saw cars, now I smelled their fumes. Where once I saw the trees blowing in the wind, now I felt it against my skin.
The sensory experience and exercise of the ride kept my mind alert, awake, and curious in a way that driving just hasn’t in a while. It felt amazing and by the time I arrived at work I was in a good mood despite the early hour.
Jill picked me up in the evening and we rode home together, sharing tidbits of information from our day. It was nice to have someone to debrief about the day's events with.
I told Jill that I had to get to Hood River tomorrow afternoon but she would be working and wasn’t going to be available to give me a ride. So, I took to The Dalles Happenings for help.
Luckily the community delivered.
The next day, Jill arrived with her usual morning herbal tea in tow and a surprise…a basket of poblano peppers to share!
“You get first pick,” she said.
Surprised but happy at the unexpected gift, I took a few for my lunch.
Jill said her pepper plants “went crazy this year” and she was glad to share.
Jill also gave me some bungees to help secure my basket to my bike!
On the ride over I told her how frustrated I was that I couldn’t take public transit between two such interconnected communities in the Gorge because of the odd bus schedule.
"Isn't it funny they call it the Get There Challenge and it sure is a challenge,” said Jill.
I agreed.
“But it sure does feel good to do things differently so I'm glad we're doing this," said Jill.
Jill asked how I planned to get to Lyle from Hood River in the evening.
I said I was going to try to catch a bus across the Hood River bridge to Bingen and then riding my bike the rest of the way to Lyle.
Around 1: p.m. Tea, who works for Columbia Gorge Community College, which participates in the challenge every year, arrived to give me a ride to Hood River.
I loaded my bike into the back of her car, noting that I was getting better at maneuvering the heavy thing into small spaces.
I thanked her.
“We were already headed this way so this worked out perfectly,” said Tea.
On the ride over I told Tea a bit about the challenge and how challenging it is to hop between communities in the Gorge using public transit. Because while many options exist for transit to doctors and vets appointments, getting to work or running an errand to another town is quite the chore.
Tea told me she totally agrees.
In a flash we were in Hood River.
And I got an excellent haircut from Last Hope Barbershop. Check it out!
Here’s me with Barber Mike Thomas who always does his best to give me a haircut that can fit my genderfluid presentation. 10/10 I would recommend Mike to anyone.
The best part about using a bike to get around Hood River? Free parking!
Feeling good about putting in some effort to look my best for the Friedreich's Ataxia Research Alliance (FARA) Energy Ball I’ll be attending in Tampa, Florida on Saturday evening, I began tackling my next problem…
How to get from Hood River to Lyle.
I checked public transportation. I could take a bus across the bridge and then bike from Bingin to Lyle. I thought about it for a second.. but riding along highway 14 wasn’t my first choice.
Luckily just then my co-worker Robin Denning texted me, she was kitesurfing in Hood River and could give me a ride home after she was done if I wanted.
Feeling grateful, I hopped on my bike and went down to the waterfront. It struck me then for the first time, that although it was taking a lot more of my time and brainpower to get around without a car I was gaining something pretty big in return. I realized just how much more connected to my community I felt now. And carpooling just felt like a really nice way to start and end my day..
And that same realization hit me again and again as the days went on. There’s something about just getting to share space with someone during those morning and evening transits, and talk about our days and what’s coming down the line next that was really improving my quality of life.
And I also realized that it was helping me feel less alone.
Getting to remote work at the Hood River waterfront was a pretty sweet way to spend my afternoon!
Then Thursday hit.
Jill had told me she was going out of town so I’d managed to snag a carpool in to work with my co-worker Robin. She picked me up at around 10 a.m. which felt late now that I’d started to adapt to Jill’s early morning schedule. Robin told me that she was also going to work late, so I’d have to find another way home.
Such is the life of a Get There Challenge participant, I thought, you have to be flexible. I’ll figure something out.
Robin and Sammy Dog giving me a ride to work.
So, of course, then I worked all day and time passed by and pretty soon it was time to go home and I hadn’t found a ride home yet, so I decided today was the day I tested myself and my Destiny. (Destiny is the name of my Trek Mtn. bike.)
I decided to ride my bike from The Dalles, OR to Lyle, WA.
It’s only 13 miles I thought. It can’t be that bad.
But I was a fool.
Things started out pretty good to be fair. I left work at 5:30 p.m. Plenty of time to get there, I thought.
I made it through town and up the little hill going up to the bridge and when I got there I stopped in at McDonald’s for some take-out…at which point I received some words requesting I not take my bike through the drive through again.
“The drive through is for motor vehicles only,” said the staff member.
Oops. I hadn’t known, I thought all drive throughs were like biker-friendly Burgerville, guess not.
Me thinking I’m cool pre-getting a talking to.
I stuffed some fries and chicken nuggets into my mouth and resumed my journey at 6:15 p.m.
As I started to cross the bridge the hairs on the back of my neck started to stand up as I realized that this situation was sketchy. I tend to not be a big driving, riding or walking over bridges fan to start with and this one in particular wasn’t looking very bike friendly.
The bridge had been undergoing repairs for months and was still very much a construction zone, with odd bolts sticking out of the surface of the road, unsecured plywood covering gaps in the sidewalk, and debris scattered here and there. Several sections of the bridge simply had no shoulder or sidewalk space to use at all.
And for the first time ever I noticed that the bridge deck had a bit of a sideways slant to it. I guess it’s not extreme enough to notice much in the car but you certainly notice it on a bike. The slant definitely caused my bike to tilt at a more extreme angle than I was used to.
But ignoring my intuition, I kept going. I have to get home somehow, I thought.
Almost instantaneously fate decided it had had enough of me ignoring the signs.
As I started to really get my power pedal on going up the hill the basket bungee corded to the back of my bike gave way under the strain of the tilt of the bridge and my laptop, water bottle, and McDonald’s went flying across two lanes of traffic.
Cursing silently I came to a stop and signaled to the oncoming traffic to stop while I grabbed all my things. They drove right past me oblivious. At first this made me mad, didn’t they see me waving? I thought. But in truth they didn’t run over my stuff or me so in the end no harm no foul.
And behind me a truck came to a stop and put on their hazards and began patiently waiting for me to gather my things.
Grateful, I quickly got my bike and my stuff out of the road and onto a bit of sidewalk that was available so that I could assess the damage. Everything was fine, even my chicken nuggets, although my pride and my shins were a little bruised.
The image of a “secure your load” public service announcement popped into my head and I grimaced in embarrassment. I certainly hadn’t meant to cause a safety hazard, but there I was.
I assessed the basket and the grade of the bridge and came to the conclusion that the basket would just fall off again if I didn’t do something different. Looking to the west I could see the sun was starting to set and I still had a long journey ahead of me. Thinking quickly I whipped off my belt and belted the basket down.
This is my “yikes” face.
Once I was sure it was as secure as it could be I started to power walk the bike across the bridge in order to keep the bike at a more level angle. At times I had to walk directly in the road because there was no sidewalk available that was wide enough for me or the bike. I was definitely grateful for my neon yellow reflective vest in those moments and for the cars and semi trucks that gave me a wide berth.
By the time I reached the other side, construction workers were arriving to begin their evening shifts on the bridge. One construction worker, a woman named Natalie, got out of her truck and walked over to me.
She was concerned for me, she wanted to know where I was heading and if I knew the bridge was about to be closed until Monday.
I told her I did know and that I was trying to get home to Lyle.
“Let me ask if I can give you a ride,” she said.
At first I refused, I’m the one who’s gotten myself into this mess after all, I thought I’ve got to get myself out of it. I didn’t want to inconvenience anyone else.
But Natalie took one look at my frazzled and sweaty appearance, and the sun sinking lower and lower in the western sky and wasn’t having it. She went full mom mode and pretty soon she was loading me and my bike into her truck.
“I can drive you to the store,” she said.
Natalie dropped me off at Murdock Mini Mart with a warning to be wary of the lack of shoulder on the road, truck drivers who might not see me, and any unsavory characters that might try to pick me up.
She gave me her number and told me to call her if I ran into trouble and to let her know when I got home.
I thanked her with a hug. Assuring her that I would be okay and that I would let her know when I got home.
Then I had to book it, from here on it was a race against the sun.
I definitely didn’t want to be riding along Highway 14 in the dark.
I jumped on my bike and started to peddle as fast as I could. The downhill part was great, I felt like I was flying through the Gorge at golden hour. The light was just stunning. But after the initial downhill… the next ten or so miles were brutal.
Truthfully I hadn’t biked that far in a while and my muscles were screaming. Plus Natalie was right, there was no shoulder, and where there was shoulder there was fallen rock and potholes, and other assorted debris.
Every time a car or a semi went past I thought this is it, this is how I die. A bit melodramatic maybe, but it’s true.
Finally I arrived at the Lyle tunnel. I looked everywhere for the button that alerts drivers that a pedestrian is in the tunnel, but I couldn’t find it, (It turned out I’d ridden past it much earlier, the westbound button is located pretty far ahead of where the tunnel is.) It was almost fully dark now, so steeling myself, I checked to make sure my headlamp and tail light were working, got a running start at it and plowed through as fast as I could. Luckily it was smooth sailing.
I let out a triumphant howl that echoed throughout the tunnel.
And then finally, finally, I arrived at the Lyle mini mart just as true darkness arrived and the first stars began to peak out.
My feelings were a mix of elation and never again.
I sent Natalie a photo and a quick text telling her I was safe…and then I promptly went into the store, bought a tub of ice cream and ate it all in celebration.
Made it! This is the photo I sent to Natalie.
Annnnd this is the photo i accidentally took when I opened up my front facing camera….yikes I look beat.
The next day Robin and I carpooled to work and I told her my tale.
She was glad I was okay. We both agreed zip ties would be a better securing tool for the basket then bungees or a belt in the future.
I didn’t ride my bike at all that following day. In fact I even broke down and borrowed Robin’s car to take a trip across town to follow up on a story about a car driving through a local businesses storefront instead of biking or walking over. I felt a little guilty about it, I could have ridden my bike…but I was still nursing my wounds from the night before and I just wasn’t feeling it.
The rest of the challenge was pretty uneventful and peaceful thankfully.
More free parking! Can you tell I like giving the thumbs up in photos yet?
Jill and Robin were my carpool buddies and I rode my bike around town to appointments, meetings, the grocery store and interviews. People were intrigued by what I was doing. Everywhere I went I was struck by just how often I would hear people say:
“That’s awesome you’re doing the challenge. I’d love to do that but I can’t.”
People had lots of totally valid reasons why of course, from hectic schedules, to kids after school practices, to fitness levels, to lack of available transport options. So, unfortunately it seems that while most people would like to be doing more to save money, the environment, and connect with their community, there are significant cultural, societal, and infrastructure barriers to them participating.
Learning this made me feel very lucky and privileged indeed to have a flexible work schedule that allows me to take part in a challenge like this and to have the opportunity to meet new people and experience transportation not just as a means to an end, where trips feel like just one long series of roads leading to various buildings and parks, but as an entire sensory experience.
All in all I think that while it’s probably not possible for me to keep up the pace of my current carpooling and biking routine all of the time, as it takes a lot of time to arrange carshares, carpools, and public transit but it has opened my eyes to the fact that this is certainly a practice and a lifestyle that I would like to adopt for the majority of future moving forward.
Why? Because it just feels good to save the earth by lowering fossil fuel emissions, keep the miles down on my car, and spend my commute connecting with other people in my community. Plus it’s saved me a ton of money.*
So, whether or not I win any prizes for participating in this challenge, I feel confident that I’ve already won something even better: the inspiration I needed to continue striving to lead a lifestyle with fewer single occupancy car rides.
And I hope that by sharing my story with you, maybe you’ve gotten to witness and experience some of that inspiration along with me.
Thank you for following along with our Get There Challenge series!
If you want to read about how I got started on this journey CLICK HERE.
I’m looking forward to future rides, carpools, and public transit adventures! Until next time…have a great day!
