Day 30 – Do the hoooookey pokey!
Winona, Minnesota to Viroqua, Wisconsin
I slept well today for the first time in a couple of nights, on a real mattress on a real (bunk) bed. It was lovely. Though I must say that my alarm went off and I looked out the window to see people already loading up the truck. Honestly, we must have some real morning people in this group. Our breakfast was a little shotty today at the cafeteria, but we had an exciting announcement that we had a new crew member joining us: her father Mark! (We lost a crew member a couple of days ago for a personal crisis.)
This whole day was absolutely gorgeous as we traveled through and finally climbed out of the Mississippi River valley. I have driven through the area many, many times, but never have I experienced it as I did today on the bike. The first twenty miles led us from Winona to Dakota, MN. The entire route was along the river, and we even travelled a couple of miles on an intimate little bike path through the trees and parallel to the bank. Perfect slow, pokey, lazy, content riding. Ben was our little gentleman this morning, reaching down on the bike and picking wildflowers from the side of the road for us. He even wore some in his helmut and Sean had a whole garden stuck into his handlebar bag.
Eventually we turned back onto hwy 14 and then exited towards Dakato. Here we were greeted so warmly by the Meyer family, and I was grateful that I hadn’t had much of a breakfast at the cafeteria because they had loads of yummy yummy food for us. It was so fantastic, this family has hosted this Minnesotan breakfast for the Big Riders for years now. They had signed posters up from previous years and photo albums of previous riders. They even had pictures already printed off of us, and asked for our autographs! How cool. One of the girls conducted an interview with us, and in exchange we were given hand-made bracelets to keep with us. Truly I cherish mine, what a good memory. As one of the former riders wrote on her poster, they truly made us feel at home. These are the people who are inspiring.
We moved on down to La Crescent and across the bridge to La Crosse. Right beforehand I watched as a car immediately in front of us came to a quick and random complete stop, and then watched as Sean slammed right into the back of it. He fell, rolled, and sprang up just like a bouncey ball. He was totally fine, as was the car and the bike, but it certainly woke us up. The bridge across the Mississippi was huge, and we soon found ourselves taking pictures of the sign for state number five: Wisconsin. Ben was even bold enough to lay right in the flowerbed under the sign.
Once in La Crosse, the traffic was a little hectic through the downtown area. We were even witness to a fender-bender accident ahead of us (thank goodness it had nothing to do with us). On our left we watched the world’s larges six pack approach at the city brewery. Of course we were with Micheal Yee and Helen who convinced us to stop at the gift shop and visitor’s center.
The mighty Mississippi remained on our righthand side for a while longer, and I took so many pictures. It was so beautiful with the bluffs on our left, the train tracks immediately on our right, the shoreline after that, followed by green algae and lily pads speckled with bright yellow flowers, fishermen mingling in the shallow waters, and the river’s expanse topped off with the western bluffs on the far shore. I’ve never appreciated the river as much as I did today.
Slowly we turned east again and began to climb out of the valley. The whole experience was breathtaking, absolute picturesque landscape. I couldn’t believe it. Steep rolling, rolling hills on a small rural road surrounded with fields of corn and hay dotted with trees and bluffs. It was Amish country as well, and I spotted long black clothes on clothes lines, waved to a family in a horse and buggy crossing our path, and admired and awed the neatly piled bunches of hand-bundled hay. It was incredible. The scenery was too overwhelming to photograph even.
We had a super steep 1.5 mile climb at one point, as well as a super steep descent that was curvy, and thrilling. I was having so much fun, and really had no idea how fast I was going until afterwards my jaw dropped at my computer’s max speed of 47.1 mph. Sean and I tried to convince Kathy to drive us back up to the top to do it again, but she wasn’t biting at the idea.
Viroqua was our destination today, a cute little town of 4,300 people. It was a short day about 67 miles, but we took our time so much at the Meyers and through the terrain that we got into camp pretty late. It was blissful to just lay around, even before showering, and just hanging out. Sean helped me change my chain, and it was a very educational experience. Ane and I ate dinner at the Viroqua co-op store, and I seriously felt like I was in heaven. I ate piles of organ salad with everything on it I could have dreamt up, and then enjoyed some soy ice cream treats. This little town sure knows how to build and stock a co-op, it was like a mini Whole Foods!
Tonight I plan on sleeping out under the stars again, we have a fairly quiet piece of land at the fair grounds with plenty of nice green grass.
I slept well today for the first time in a couple of nights, on a real mattress on a real (bunk) bed. It was lovely. Though I must say that my alarm went off and I looked out the window to see people already loading up the truck. Honestly, we must have some real morning people in this group. Our breakfast was a little shotty today at the cafeteria, but we had an exciting announcement that we had a new crew member joining us: her father Mark! (We lost a crew member a couple of days ago for a personal crisis.)
This whole day was absolutely gorgeous as we traveled through and finally climbed out of the Mississippi River valley. I have driven through the area many, many times, but never have I experienced it as I did today on the bike. The first twenty miles led us from Winona to Dakota, MN. The entire route was along the river, and we even travelled a couple of miles on an intimate little bike path through the trees and parallel to the bank. Perfect slow, pokey, lazy, content riding. Ben was our little gentleman this morning, reaching down on the bike and picking wildflowers from the side of the road for us. He even wore some in his helmut and Sean had a whole garden stuck into his handlebar bag.
Eventually we turned back onto hwy 14 and then exited towards Dakato. Here we were greeted so warmly by the Meyer family, and I was grateful that I hadn’t had much of a breakfast at the cafeteria because they had loads of yummy yummy food for us. It was so fantastic, this family has hosted this Minnesotan breakfast for the Big Riders for years now. They had signed posters up from previous years and photo albums of previous riders. They even had pictures already printed off of us, and asked for our autographs! How cool. One of the girls conducted an interview with us, and in exchange we were given hand-made bracelets to keep with us. Truly I cherish mine, what a good memory. As one of the former riders wrote on her poster, they truly made us feel at home. These are the people who are inspiring.
We moved on down to La Crescent and across the bridge to La Crosse. Right beforehand I watched as a car immediately in front of us came to a quick and random complete stop, and then watched as Sean slammed right into the back of it. He fell, rolled, and sprang up just like a bouncey ball. He was totally fine, as was the car and the bike, but it certainly woke us up. The bridge across the Mississippi was huge, and we soon found ourselves taking pictures of the sign for state number five: Wisconsin. Ben was even bold enough to lay right in the flowerbed under the sign.
Once in La Crosse, the traffic was a little hectic through the downtown area. We were even witness to a fender-bender accident ahead of us (thank goodness it had nothing to do with us). On our left we watched the world’s larges six pack approach at the city brewery. Of course we were with Micheal Yee and Helen who convinced us to stop at the gift shop and visitor’s center.
The mighty Mississippi remained on our righthand side for a while longer, and I took so many pictures. It was so beautiful with the bluffs on our left, the train tracks immediately on our right, the shoreline after that, followed by green algae and lily pads speckled with bright yellow flowers, fishermen mingling in the shallow waters, and the river’s expanse topped off with the western bluffs on the far shore. I’ve never appreciated the river as much as I did today.
Slowly we turned east again and began to climb out of the valley. The whole experience was breathtaking, absolute picturesque landscape. I couldn’t believe it. Steep rolling, rolling hills on a small rural road surrounded with fields of corn and hay dotted with trees and bluffs. It was Amish country as well, and I spotted long black clothes on clothes lines, waved to a family in a horse and buggy crossing our path, and admired and awed the neatly piled bunches of hand-bundled hay. It was incredible. The scenery was too overwhelming to photograph even.
We had a super steep 1.5 mile climb at one point, as well as a super steep descent that was curvy, and thrilling. I was having so much fun, and really had no idea how fast I was going until afterwards my jaw dropped at my computer’s max speed of 47.1 mph. Sean and I tried to convince Kathy to drive us back up to the top to do it again, but she wasn’t biting at the idea.
Viroqua was our destination today, a cute little town of 4,300 people. It was a short day about 67 miles, but we took our time so much at the Meyers and through the terrain that we got into camp pretty late. It was blissful to just lay around, even before showering, and just hanging out. Sean helped me change my chain, and it was a very educational experience. Ane and I ate dinner at the Viroqua co-op store, and I seriously felt like I was in heaven. I ate piles of organ salad with everything on it I could have dreamt up, and then enjoyed some soy ice cream treats. This little town sure knows how to build and stock a co-op, it was like a mini Whole Foods!
Tonight I plan on sleeping out under the stars again, we have a fairly quiet piece of land at the fair grounds with plenty of nice green grass.
posted by elizabeth at 5:25 PM
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