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On the 5th we started out for Minnesota. We took a tour of the
Mayville State College
(small) & the courthouse. By this time we found out about a tornado that had
swept through the area the previous night destroying the town of Gary, MN. J
broke a few spokes and we ate lunch at Halstad, MN. J's 2nd spoke broke just
outside of here, we stopped to fix it, and while doing that another pressman
came up and got enough info for another
article
about is.
The devastation down the road from the tornados was amazing, really toppled things
over. We stayed in
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Mahnomen & J & I called home to reassure the folks.
That town was also in total disarray from the winds. On the 6th we headed for
Itasca Lake.
God, to be in trees again. Went swimming in the lake! Wow.
The road to this point was very good; a little thunk-thunk but OK (no shoulder). From
Itasca to Park Rapids the[re] is a designated bike shoulder. P.R. is a sucker-swindler
place and I didn't like it. J over filled his tire and it really blew —sounded
like a fire cracker. We bought new tubes.
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There's a tail wind from
Park Rapids to Walker on an old RR grade. Super cool! You
cruise with no cars back in the woods. Stayed in Ackely.
7-7-78 ~485 total 1945. Left in the rain about 5:45 & café about 6:45.
Continued to Walker by trail and washed sand off our bikes there. The road is definite
thunk-thunk. Ate dinner in Rener & I bought new socks. We're spending the night in
Jacobson. The store closed about 15 min. before we got here and there's no café.
Shit. Mosquitoes are most assuredly VLBD [voracious long billed despicable]. J's going
to
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stop in Duluth to get his rim redone and I think I'll ride on an[d] bypass city.
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- July 5
- Mahnomea, Minnesota
- July 6
- Park Rapids, Minnesota
- July 7
- Jacobsen, Minnesota
- July 8
- Cornucopia, Wisconsin
Credit where credit is due. The term "voracious long billed despicable mosquitoes" needs to be credited to
either Lewis or Clark. We picked that up on some historical marker not far from Itasca Lake. It was very
accurate.
The term "thunk-thunk" creeps in here, too. Probably due to the cold winters and hot summers, the concrete roads
tended to have a big space between the sections of concrete. As you ride over these, you get a distinct
"thunk-thunk" from your tires. If you are sitting down, the "thunk-thunk" goes all the way to your skull, it
works a lot like Chinese Water Torture.
It never occurred to me how crossing a river the size of the Mississippi, at his point, could be so
memorable. I crossed it three times (the third time in
Illinois). I had never seen it before and therefore really did not know
how big it was. Very was some magic about it as you will see.
While camped at Jacobsen, we met a couple there (John and Colleen, their last names have been lost). She had done a
trans-am the prior year and actually had an Azuki like mine. They were school teachers canoeing down the Mississippi
for their honeymoon.
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