Day 25 – God’s country.
DeSmet, South Dakota to Tyler, Minnesota
Welcome to Minnesota everyone! Oh glorious state. Today was a great day, only 78 miles, and we had a lot of fun despite the ever constant headwind. It was supposed to become a tailwind immediately upon crossing the state line, but apparently the wind gods are on vacation. We had a good gas station coffee break at our eight a.m. waterstop today. Lucky for us it was a Sinclaire station with the well-known green dinosaur out front. Naturally that just begs for a photo op, and we piled on.
Eastern South Dakota, also knowing that Minnesota was coming has been a profound mood lifter. All day today we were surrounded by green: rows of corn, soy beans that to me look like fields of green sequins, even the grass was finally green. And lakes! Holy moly we saw our first real lakes since Idaho I think, and that was such a sweet sight for sore eyes. I’ve been missing water, and definitely took some pictures. Our last decent sized South Dakota town of the trip was Brookings, which was a cute little place around mile 40 and made for a lazy waterstop outside of a connected coffee shop and bike store. Oh could we have asked for anything more. Yes: free ice cream there. What a town. We stayed there for probably an hour before moving on, eating ice cream, chilling, talking to locals, enjoying the comfortable temperature.
Finally back on the road we met three people bannering a sign for Margo and offering cool powerade. They were super sweet, and so much fun to meet. The next twenty miles brought us to the state border, with a sign much more elaborate than any state marker yet, complete with a stone mounting and wooden sign. That’s Minnesota for you! Kathy had her water stop here, and we lazed around here for a while too, which was so lovely. I could have stayed there all day in the shade, enjoying the company. Yesterday we were in so early that we got so hungry before dinner, and we figured that we might as well take our time out on the road as long as the weather was cool enough. There was even a mysterious chilly breeze that we’d feel every once in a while, the weather was perfect.
Congratulations to South Dakota and Minnesota for being so energy conscious, there were many wind farms on our way through the borderland today. Those things look so cool stretched out along the fields and the sky. Alongside the road there was a little building with two of the wind turbine blades sitting out front. They were HUGE, and we stopped for pictures and flyers to learn more about them. Of course I just think they look cool and appreciate their energy consciouness, but I was riding with all engineering students who were talking watts and etc. etc. :)
The rest of the ride in was windy, but otherwise not bad. Tyler, MN is a cute little town that greeted us with delicious watermelon (which I ate seven pieces of). We’re setting up camp on some beautifully grassy and shady grounds outside of the old Folk school.
Welcome to Minnesota everyone! Oh glorious state. Today was a great day, only 78 miles, and we had a lot of fun despite the ever constant headwind. It was supposed to become a tailwind immediately upon crossing the state line, but apparently the wind gods are on vacation. We had a good gas station coffee break at our eight a.m. waterstop today. Lucky for us it was a Sinclaire station with the well-known green dinosaur out front. Naturally that just begs for a photo op, and we piled on.
Eastern South Dakota, also knowing that Minnesota was coming has been a profound mood lifter. All day today we were surrounded by green: rows of corn, soy beans that to me look like fields of green sequins, even the grass was finally green. And lakes! Holy moly we saw our first real lakes since Idaho I think, and that was such a sweet sight for sore eyes. I’ve been missing water, and definitely took some pictures. Our last decent sized South Dakota town of the trip was Brookings, which was a cute little place around mile 40 and made for a lazy waterstop outside of a connected coffee shop and bike store. Oh could we have asked for anything more. Yes: free ice cream there. What a town. We stayed there for probably an hour before moving on, eating ice cream, chilling, talking to locals, enjoying the comfortable temperature.
Finally back on the road we met three people bannering a sign for Margo and offering cool powerade. They were super sweet, and so much fun to meet. The next twenty miles brought us to the state border, with a sign much more elaborate than any state marker yet, complete with a stone mounting and wooden sign. That’s Minnesota for you! Kathy had her water stop here, and we lazed around here for a while too, which was so lovely. I could have stayed there all day in the shade, enjoying the company. Yesterday we were in so early that we got so hungry before dinner, and we figured that we might as well take our time out on the road as long as the weather was cool enough. There was even a mysterious chilly breeze that we’d feel every once in a while, the weather was perfect.
Congratulations to South Dakota and Minnesota for being so energy conscious, there were many wind farms on our way through the borderland today. Those things look so cool stretched out along the fields and the sky. Alongside the road there was a little building with two of the wind turbine blades sitting out front. They were HUGE, and we stopped for pictures and flyers to learn more about them. Of course I just think they look cool and appreciate their energy consciouness, but I was riding with all engineering students who were talking watts and etc. etc. :)
The rest of the ride in was windy, but otherwise not bad. Tyler, MN is a cute little town that greeted us with delicious watermelon (which I ate seven pieces of). We’re setting up camp on some beautifully grassy and shady grounds outside of the old Folk school.
posted by elizabeth at 11:15 PM
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