A Delayed Departure

With my first day off officially behind me, I was ready to hit the road again with the goal being a campground about 125 km to the west. I didn’t get the earliest start to the day but I was ready to go around 8:30 AM. That’s when the day’s plan changed a bit.

As I loaded my final bag onto my bike, I happened to notice a small white spot on the tread of my front tire. In actuality, it wasn’t so much a small white spot ON my tire but a small hole IN the tire which revealed the white liner underneath. My keen deductive reasoning skills led me to the conclusion that that wasn’t good. I’m so smart sometimes. I was going to need a bike shop. Fortunately, there were a couple of options in Fargo.

Well, I SAY there were a couple of options but I couldn’t find the first one (you know, the one that opened at 9:00 AM) so I had to continue on to the one that opened at 10:00 AM (aka. Great Northern Bicycle Co.). All things considered, that turned out ok. Yes, I found myself sitting in front of said bike shop for about 30 minutes waiting for it to open but I found things to do to fill the time. Not necessarily productive things. But things. And eventually 10:00 AM arrived and the store opened. And that’s how I met Aaron. Side note: The Great Northern Bicycle Co. is in an old train station and is a pretty fantastic location.

Oh, and speaking of location, I kind of glossed over the fact that my trek into Fargo was also a trek into North Dakota (aka. state number 8 of this tour). Once again, there was no grand (or not-so-grand) signage to mark the occasion.

When I had my bike overhauled before I started this journey, I only replaced the rear tire which was more than a little well worn. The front one, on the other hand, still looked to have quite a bit of life left on it so I figured I might as well get as much mileage out of it as I could (this morning that number was revealed to be about 2,500 km). I probably could’ve ridden it a bit longer but with services becoming further and further apart as I head west, it made sense to swap it out now. So I did. Well, Aaron made the swap. I was merely a witness.The brakes pads (which had taken to squealing a bit over the past few days) were also swapped out.

The necessary preventative maintenance was taken care of by about 10:30 AM and I was back on my way. The way in question wasn’t exactly the paved roads I was hoping for and a few times I opted to deviate from Google’s route in an effort to return to paved roads. Thanks Google.

While most of today’s ride was heading west, there were a few occasions where heading south was needed. With the wind blowing from the southeast, those southern segments were more than a little unpleasant. Fortunately, the longest of those segments was only about 15 km. Of course, I say “only” after the fact. At the time it was a very challenging 15 km. From that point on though it was paved roads and generally favourable winds.

I ended up taking a lunch break at the end of that aforementioned 15 km segment in the town of Kindred where there was a pavilion with picnic tables. As has been well documented by now, those are two great things when you’re on the road. I made a quick stop at the gas station to top up my water bottles before hitting the road again. It wasn’t until then that I noticed my new front tire was significantly wider than my original one. My tire width for all my previous tours has been 28 mm. This new tire was 35 mm. My concern was that wider tires would be noticeably slower. I concluded that that was not the case since I didn’t even notice I had the wider tires until after at least 25 km of riding. And who knows, maybe they actually helped on some of those gravel roads. Fortunately, there were no further gravel roads after Kindred.

Today was by far the busiest day in terms of seeing other touring cyclists. Of course, that’s not really saying much since I’d seen VERY few on the road since I began this trip. However, today I crossed paths with two groups of two cyclists heading the opposite direction (we waved but didn’t stop to chat). Later, I actually caught up and passed a solo tourist – I think he actually kind of wanted to chat but I was really moving well at that point and really didn’t want to slow my pace. I felt a bit guilty about that but part of me thought we’d cross paths at the campground tonight. Spoiler Alert: We didn’t. Late in the day, I caught up with two other cyclists and, much to my surprise, I knew them. It was Christopher and Ryan who I’d first met at Martha and Geoffrey’s farm a few days back. Generally I’m not one to ride with others but I rode with them for a bit as we discussed our days on the road since our last meeting. Surprisingly, they had also started in Moorhead this morning but they had a much more ambitious day planned. When I caught up with them I only had about 20 km left in my ride. They still had about 90.

While I briefly considered going further, I really didn’t feel the need or desire to. I was perfectly happy to settle into a campsite for the remainder of the day. So, as we neared the Little Yellowstone Campground we said our goodbyes, wished each other luck, and went our separate ways. It turns out I could’ve ridden with them another kilometre or so as Google’s directions to the campground were more than a little questionable. I got there. But it wasn’t as easy as it should’ve been.

The campground in question (aka. Little Yellowstone Campground) was set in a little bit of a valley and was very nice. It had a big open space for a soccer field and ball diamond. It only had four or five tent sites but they were all vacant – well, until I arrived anyway. There was no one on site to do the registration as it was one of those self-serve registration parks. So, I filled in my information, put my cash in the envelope, and went to setup for the evening.

Setting up included another gourmet pasta dish courtesy of my alcohol stove. At some point (probably sooner rather than later) I’m going to have to find some more fuel for said stove. It burns methyl hydrate although in the US it’s called denatured alcohol. I’m hoping Bismarck, ND will have an outdoor door with such things. If all goes well, that’s three days away.

As I sit in my tent typing up this update (Side note: I’d rather be sitting at the picnic table but the mosquitos are being a bit too friendly for my liking), it appears that I’m in for another nice and warm night (and hopefully with minimal precipitation). Thanks to the warm nights, it’s been remarkable how little I’ve used my sleeping bag. Even when I’ve needed some sort of covering I’ve been relying on the silk liner which (as you may recall) was donated to me for my European tour in 2016. For most nights, it’s all I’ve needed. Side note: It’s still more than a little unfortunate that I didn’t get to meet Paul (i.e., the donator of said bag) when I was pedalling through Edinburgh. Anyway, the JagBag is still treating me very well so thanks again to Paul and TerreVista Trails.

Today’s totals:
Distance: 129.78 km
Ride time: 6:08:18
Average speed: 21.14 km/h
Maximum speed: 48.07 km/h