Author: bjregan

About halfway through the morning, two bicyclists pedaled by and I overheard one of them say to the other: “Well, you know an east wind brings rain and rain brings cooler temperatures.”  I knew that the comment was meant as encouragement because I had looked at the days route map and it showed  virtually all of our 81-mile day's ride was headed directly east.  And at that point the temperatures  were starting to warm up and that old east wind was warming itself up, too, to get ready for a big blow.

And blow it did.  The terrain was fairly flat and the landscape virtually treeless.  There was nothing to break the wind's force and very few downhills to give a break.  Even if there was a downhill a lot of those stretches still required lower gears to compensate for the wind's force. 

We encountered one significant downhill into the Des Moines River valley at Lehigh, about 18 miles from the end.  Of course, that was immediately followed by a very long, steep uphill climb, the biggest hill we've seen so far on this year's RAGBRAI.  I was thankful for the shade and break from the headwinds, although I was gasping for air by the time I made it to the top.  A few miles after that there was another hill almost as big as we dipped into and out of the Brushy Creek valley.

And then it was just more of that grueling grind headed into the east wind.  The route map showed a turn about 5 miles from the end town onto a road that headed north.  I thought I would never see that turn but when it finally appeared up ahead I practically cried tears of joy.  I knew the hardest part of the day's work was done.

Just a note about the photo above.  HyVee grocery stores are an Iowa institution and in every town they are so supportive of RAGBRAI.  Thank you, HyVee and, yes, even after a tough day like today I

With this record-breaking heat what better place to spend the night than a campground on the shores of Black Hawk Lake?  This 957-acre lake that is Iowa's southernmost glacial lake was named after the Sac Indian Chief Black Hawk.  The statue in the photo is a historic landmark that was erected in 1934.

Our host town here is the small resort commmunity of Lake View.  It's surprising how many amenities even the smallest towns can provide.  And then there's an added advantage that everything is close and it's easy to get around.  Of course, as hot as it is, there wasn't much except showers, shade and cool drinks that I was interested in looking for.

I read in today's paper that the National Weather Service reported that the first three weeks in July were the second warmest on record in Des Moines, only being exceeded by July of 1936.  Based on total precipitation so far this summer, the area is in its fifth-driest summer on record to date.  This could be the driest spell since 1927, even surpassing the Dust Bowl years.

It wasn't until the last couple of hours of pedaling today that I began to feel the excessive heat.  That's a major selling point for getting up before daylight and getting started at first light.  Overall, today's ride was one of the easiest I can remember.  There was hardly any wind, the hills were gradual and provided nice breezes on the way down, and the pass-through towns were spaced out just about right for when I needed a break.

These triple digit temperatures are supposed to be around for two more days, but I'm more than ready to get out there and tackle another RAGBRAI day tomorrow.