For me the 2011 Elkhorn Classic Stage Race started the day before the race with the 5ish hour drive out to Baker City. Two friends, Scott and Steve, also helping out the race, our gear, and 19 OBRA wheels left my house just after 10 on Thursday morning. The drive was pretty uneventful until just before Pendleton (and our scheduled lunch stop!). An ODOT truck off the right side of the road had a sign up that there was an accident ahead. Not much further, everything came to a standstill. After around 10′ sitting there, I finally shut the car down and got out to see how far up the backup was. Turns out, as far ahead as I could see.
Scott got on TripCheck to see what was going on, and learned that the freeway was closed at 12:30 (about 40 minutes before we got stuck) due to a vehicle fire. He also talked with a few truckers and learned that the vehicle that was on fire was a hay truck, and the backup was about 2 miles long at that point. We got out, took some pictures, and just waited for things to move again.
Close to an hour later things finally did start moving again. The next two miles were slow since the freeway was still down to one lane while they continued to clean up. The truck that caught fire was completely charred. And the area around the fire smelled really bad too!
Other than this slight delay the trip was uneventful. We pulled into Baker City about 4:30 and got to work pulling all the race gear out of storage at the High School. After that is was dinner at Paizano’s, and then to the Always Welcome Inn for the last good night of sleep for the weekend!
