Cruising Washington's Discovery Trail

A thin veil of mist seeps in from the ocean, blanketing the dunes and making the serpentine Discovery Trail ahead of me appear as though it winds up into the clouds. As I spin my beach cruiser through a gentle watercolor landscape, I breathe in the salt-tinged air. The cry of gulls punctuates the sound of the Pacific Ocean waves sighing onto the sand, and a breeze keeps me cool.

I'm visiting Long Beach Peninsula in the southwest corner of Washington state, a 28-mile-long finger of land that separates the Pacific Ocean from wildlife-rich Willapa Bay. Just over two centuries ago, in October 1805, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark first laid eyes on the Pacific "Ocian" here, at the end of their perilous overland journey.