bjregan

While pedaling away the miles on a typical RAGBRAI day, one of the things that often brings a smile to your face and a humorous bit of encouragement is the handmade roadside signs local residents post along the route. These are “Burma Shave” type commercials for those of you old enough to remember driving a highway and seeing a series of the signs with a partial message on each one leading to a final punch line.

Anyway, today I saw one of these sign series that I wanted to share:

1st sign: “Helpful Hints for your ride across Iowa”

2nd sign (with an arrow pointing to a cornfield on the righthand side of the road): “This is corn”

3rd sign (with an arrow pointing to a soybean field on the lefthand side of the road): “These are beans”

Punchline sign: “That’s all you need to know”

Yup, that’s the basics of what you’re going to see…lots of corn and soybean fields. But it’s hard to describe why that can still be something so beautiful to behold. You would think after having pedaled these many Iowa highways over the years that I would be tired of seeing the same thing. But after finishing the first day of this year’s ride I can’t wait to get back on the bike to pedal some more tomorrow.

We had a lot of headwinds today but I was on the road early enough this morning that I was able to finish the day before the winds got too strong. That also helped with the heat factor. It’s starting off to be a very hot week, with temperatures up to 100 the next couple of days. The most important thing is to drink lots of water and I’m careful to do that and am looking forward to another great ride tomorrow.

This morning’s first stop was in the Dutch town of Orange City.

This is the RAGBRAI baggage truck you look for at the end of the day so you can dig through the hundreds of bags laid out on the pavement to find the bag you loaded on the truck in the morning. They do a nice job of laying them out in areas labeled with the time in the morning that you loaded your bag.

Today we left Des Moines and drove 200 miles closer to Sioux Center, Iowa, where RAGBRAI starts the day after tomorrow. We are resting up in a motel near Sioux City, Iowa. Names of locations here are confusing. The map above shows Sioux City and to the north is Sioux Falls, South Dakota. But the start of RAGBRAI is Sioux Center, which is too small to show up on this map scale. Sioux Center is about 50 miles north of here above Le Mars. That means we are in a good position for getting into the RAGBRAI starting town early in the day tomorrow. The day before the ride is such a madhouse that the sooner we can roll into town the more traffic we can avoid.

All indications are that this year’s RAGBRAI will be hot and sunny, like the days and weeks we’ve spent here in Iowa, so far, getting ourselves ready. We didn’t let the heat stop us from doing lots of bike riding so now we should be acclimated for the week ahead.

We managed to find a bike trail to explore each of the days last week that we were in Des Moines. I was surprised at how many of the trails allowed us to ride in places with lots of shade trees.

Along Four Mile Creek in Des Moines near Pleasant Hill.

Start of a bike trail near downtown Des Moines. Not shady here, but most of the trail itself was shaded.

Clive Greenbelt trail along Des Moines River near the city.

Iowa State Capitol Building.

Bike Path bridge across Gray’s Lake in Des Moines.

Gay Lea Wilson Trail near Pleasant Hill.

Get Ready, Get Set…RAGBRAI XL here we come. But, remember, the GO! does not mean the start of a race. It’s a ride, not a race. It’s a rolling celebration of Iowa and I’m ready to get out there and enjoy every minute of it.