Wisconsin Redux

After spending just one night in Minnesota, I unexpectedly found myself planning a not-quite-immediate return to Wisconsin. No, that’s not a judgment on Minnesota. Or Wisconsin for that matter. It was merely a logistical happenstance that occurred when a Warm Showers host responded to my request this morning. Wisconsin, here I come. Again.

Just as a heads-up, I suspect this update may be a BIT of a long-winded one – even by my standards. Sorry. Sometimes it happens. At some point I might just type “The end.” if it gets too long. Maybe I should type “The end.” now.

The plan for the day was actually very similar to my ride from Onslow, IA to Dubuque, IA with a brief detour to the Field of Dreams Movie Site. No, I wasn’t going to Chisholm, MN to find Moonlight Graham. But I would be stopping at another movie site. It’s funny, I certainly didn’t intend for this tour to be a pilgrimage to midwest movie sites but it’s kind of turning into that. Although, in reality it’s just a coincidence. In the case of today’s stop, I actually completely forgot about the theatrical connection to Wabasha, MN. Today was a reminder.

The ride from Winona to Wabasha was to be about 60 km (much like from Onslow, IA to Dyersville, IA) and the subsequent final portion of the ride back to Wisconsin was about 35 km (much like from Dyersville, IA to Dubuque, IA). As luck would have it, most of today’s ride came with a tailwind.

The early portion of the ride out of Winona followed the river bike trail which was good and bad. The trail was in good shape and free of any traffic … well, vehicular traffic. In lieu of any vehicular traffic there were frequent clouds of gnats (or some other flying pests). They were essentially invisible as you pedalled along and then all of sudden I heard them bouncing off my helmet and felt them pelting my face and arms. Not pleasant at all. The lesson of the day? Bike with you mouth closed.

After escaping the flying protein clouds, I found myself back on regular roads heading north to Wabasha. At one point, another cyclist out for his daily ride caught up with me and we chatted for a bit. It turns out, this was actually his first ride in several months beyond the city limits as he recently had his knee replaced. He seemed happy to be pedalling again. Anyway, I told him of my not-at-all direct route to the Grand Canyon and he said, “That sounds pretty great.” He then asked if was travelling alone or meeting up with other cyclists along the way. I said that all my trips have been solo endeavours to which he responded, “That sounds pretty great, too!” I couldn’t help myself and simply said, “Yeah. It is.”

We rode along for about another kilometre before he reached his turnaround point and we went our separate ways. He wished me well on my trip. I wished him well on his knee recovery. And once again I was reminded of a couple of things. One, how lucky I am to be doing a trip like this. And two, how happy I am that I don’t have a turnaround point each day.

To say that my ride to Wabasha was easy would be quite the understatement. The terrain was more than manageable and the wind was mostly quite cooperative. Days like that don’t happen to me very often. I was sure not to under-appreciate it. In fact, I even made note of my totals after the first leg of today’s ride:

Midway totals:
Distance: 63.91 km
Ride time: 2:33:13
Average speed: 25.03 km/h (by far, the fastest average speed on this tour)
Maximum speed: 40.24 km/h

There were two points of interest that I wanted to see in Wabasha. And while I went to both, I really only saw one. The first was the National Eagle Centre. I looked around briefly but I really didn’t want to leave my bike and gear unattended for an extended period to I opted to continue on to the next stop. That said, eagles are pretty fantastic … admittedly, I’m partial to flying.

Stop number two was Slippery’s Tavern & Ristorante … Home of the Grumpy Old Men. It’d be more accurate to say that the Slippery’s in the movie was inspired by this place as the scenes in the movie weren’t actual shot inside this location … that certainly doesn’t stop the marketing of it though. Again, this is sort of Minnesota’s answer to the Rocky Steps.

Given that it was lunch time, I’m essentially a grumpy old man, and I was standing outside Slippery’s, it only made sense to go inside for lunch. So I did. A Slippery burger, fries, and a beer (Fulton Standard) later, and I was once again nourished. Actually, I was still a bit hungry but I find it’s pretty hard to fill me up these days.

While I didn’t have a scheduled time to arrive at my Warm Showers hosts, I felt that there was no rush to get back on the bike. As such, I wandered over to the gift shop to see what they had. Of course, I’m not much of a souvenir buyer and, even if I was, travelling by bike pretty much negates any thoughts of adding more items to the bike. Instead, I took some photos of the various paraphernalia on offer. I also chatted with the woman at the store for a bit. When she found out I was from Canada she was very curious about our healthcare system (she had definitely heard a lot of inaccurate information). We also chatted about travel in general, Grumpy Old Men (the movie, not me), and other such things before it was time for me to hit the road again. At least briefly.

Despite riding in the sun all morning, clouds had moved in while I ate lunch – that’s what I get for stopping! Anyway, I was only on the road a few minutes when the drops started. Fortunately, right at that moment there was a driveway with a temporary garage/shelter just calling out to me. I answered. And I answered for about 15 minutes. After that the mini storm had blown through and the rain had stopped. I figured I still had about two hours left on the road so I set out once again hoping there would be no further rain.

My final destination for the day was a farm in Stockholm, WI. And just like my first arrival in Wisconsin, I was once again greeted with a sign. Wisconsin was 2 for 2 on the signage front.

My hopes for a dry ride to end the day were dashed about 7 km from Stockholm. On the upside, I didn’t get ambushed by a torrential downpour and just a steady rain for about 3 km. In all honesty, it felt pretty good as it had been a hot day. Plus, despite the general flat terrain of the day, I had been warned that there was a 400′ climb to get to the farm so cooling off a bit before that climb was likely a bit beneficial.

I should probably just type “The end.” now but I’m getting close to the end so bear with me for a bit longer. Or not. You have free will, you can do as you choose.

So apparently you chose to keep with me a bit longer. Ok, I’ll try to be brief.

My hosts for the night were Martha and Geoffrey – although, Geoffrey worked nights so essentially it was all Martha. And Martha was great. So knowledgeable and not just about all things farming, cows, chickens, eggs, making cheese – I learned so much about making cheese (and have since forgotten so much about making cheese) and I even got to sample some of Martha’s homemade cheese – SO good. Oh … and she was making peanut butter and jam cookies, too (yes, you read that right.) Also SO good. Anyway, she was really interesting to meet and talk with about so many topics. And she and Geoffrey are very generous and welcoming hosts – so much so that in addition to hosting me, they’d also offered to host two other cyclists who didn’t arrive until after 9:30.

The arrival of the other cyclists, Christopher and Ryan, added an unexpected surprise to the day. We were sitting in the kitchen talking about our respective trips when Christopher asks, “Are you Mark Weinstein?” As you would expect, I was not expecting that!

It turns out they had also stayed with Dave in Ashkum, IL where my name and trip were discussed. They had also stayed at Frances’ farm in Indiana. And they had seen my name in the guest book at the city park in Wenona, IL. It was pretty odd. And amusing. They seemed very happy that they had caught up with me.

The end.

Today’s totals:
Distance: 98.75 km
Ride time: 4:13:51
Average speed: 23.34 km/h
Maximum speed: 46.48 km/h