Corvallis is the town where my mother went to college. It was kind of fun to hang around the town where my mother was when she was my age.

This is the moment in the journey where I start to have big-picture realizations about myself and the trip. This is the moment when I start to learn the lessons this journey had to teach me.

From my journal:

[I rode] Old Corvallis road, which wound through farm country. It was pretty, of course, but all of this scenery is starting to blur together.

This [ride] is a once-in-a-lifetime experience for me, and by that, I mean I only ever want to do it once in my lifetime. It's a tool of exploration and self-discovery which I am leveraging at an age when I can. It's a means to an end.

By this point, I am well aware that I am not riding my bicycle for the simple pleasure of riding a bicycle. There are people who are this way (hello, Wilsons!! Thank you :)) but I am not one. I am on this trip to challenge myself. To meet people and see new things and learn what I can and can't do. This is the moment of the trip when I started to become philosophical about it.