In my city we average 42 inches of rain per year, which is four inches above the U.S. average. Spain gets like 25 inches of rain annually, so clearly spring has been a soggy mess on the plains and dales and mountains and everywhere in my area. There’s a fatique that comes with that much rain. A hopelessness that it will never be sunny again or that you may never, ever see the blue sky unless you leave and go to another city perhaps in Spain.

Today marks the last day of my Spring Break. My expectations for this vacation are always extremely low. Some people can rally and book a trip someplace like Las Vegas or Los Angeles or Paris, but I don’t like week long trips to places overseas. I’ve been to L.A. and Vegas doesn’t interest me and I mean a week is not long enough. I like to set up camp and get to know a place. But more than that, but most importantly I don’t have the energy. Summer is around the corner and experience has taught me that it’s better to rest and. find my life again.

Monday we took our sailboat to the boat yard for some work. I wasn’t going to join my husband onboard because there was rain in the forecast and my friends, the only thing worse that being on a bike in the pouring rain is being on a sailboat under the same conditions. But the skies, while menacing didn’t rain. They glowered and grayed and clouded and scowled but then there was a break and I saw some blue and I found myself forgiving the great Northwest rain gods for their moods.  

We even saw seals. I do not know much about smelt but the numbers are high this year (or so said everyone upon learning that we saw seals) and for the first time the seals are abundant on the Columbia River. It was amazing to behold.

What I assumed would be a terrible weather day turned out spectacular. The seals and the break in the rain and seeing the sky was like finding a hundred dollar bill. It reminded me that even with all the prognostications and apps that in-between the storms and gloom there is such beauty. Now it might not happen again for another 40 days but I took photos and video to record the moment.

That’s at the heart of any vacation too. You leave or vacate your life and routine and go do something, somewhere else and come back refreshed and ready to take on the next thing in the routine. Back in January I was contemplating a trip to Nice, France. Ticket prices were good and I was starting to consider an itinerary, and yet, I knew that it wouldn’t work. Realistically I knew I’d feel like I do during most spring breaks, exhausted, enervated and weary.

But I know that on the other side of those clouds there’s a blue sky trying to break through. I know that as I move into the downhill portion of the school year I’ll think of those seals out there on the river doing their thing and barking at the boats and I’ll know I saw them and for a moment I forgot about everything else and that was wild abandon.

Happy Easter to you if you celebrate and happy, dry trails ahead. Although I think for me that will be in July.

Stay safe (and dry) out there,

Bike Goddess