[ORRando] Down the Drain brevet coming up in September

[Michal Young]

Dear Randos, 
     I hope several of you will make the trek to Eugene to ride Down the Drain in early September.  Here are a few things I'd like to alert you to now: 

1)  The NCAA inexplicably did not consult the ORR brevet schedule before scheduling the fall football season, and foolishly scheduled a Ducks home football game the same weekend as Down the Drain.  This is surely going to cause football fans trouble in finding local lodging, and it's possible the football fans may in turn use some hotel rooms that would otherwise be available to the hordes of randonneurs expected to converge on Eugene for the big event.   Of course it's *just* a 200k, so PDX-based randos may choose to drive down and back in a single day, but if you were thinking of taking a hotel, you'll need to plan ahead.  

2)  The starting point will not be the visitor parking lot as stated in the current draft cue sheet, because that parking lot no longer exists, but it won't be far away.  I'm currently considering the north parking lot of Amazon Park, about a mile away, for convenient (free) parking and available restrooms.   

3)  Bill Alsup has created a nice permanent route from Sesame Donuts in Southwest Portland to Ninkasi Brewing in Eugene --- "Donuts to Domination", permanent 1176.  He has also created a permanent in the other direction, route 1177, from Eugene to Beaverton.  Find them at http://goo.gl/WCwIv .  If you're a PDX-based rando, you can ride 200k to Eugene, then 200k down to Drain and back through Cottage grove, and finally 200k back to your home territory.  I know none of you will want to miss that. 

4) Ed and David set a high standard for junk food offerings on the Olney-Gothic Logger.  You may think we eat only tofu and organic free-range goat-milk yogurt down here in hippieland, but we'll do our very best to provide a range of unhealthy alternatives. 

See you there (or here, rather) September 8.  

--Michal