Sunday, July 17, 2011

Still hot

We didn't rush out early this morning. There were some kids partying right outside our room until about 2, so I slept until 7:30. Of course we were in an air conditioned building and the contrast when we stepped outside was startling. Right back to the steam room. Fortunately there were clouds & fog so we didn't have to deal with direct sun right away. It was about 9 in the morning and the temperature was already in the 80s.

It was one of those days. Within a couple of miles Bruce had to stop and re-pack. His cool, no-rack-required bag was sagging onto his rear wheel. He fixed it, but it sagged again. The second repair worked. I stopped to eat a bite and realized that the mouthpiece of my Camelbak had fallen off - nothing keeping the water from pouring out. I had felt a few drops on my leg, but naturally I couldn't remember how long ago. Bruce had stopped to make some refinements to his packing, so I left the leaky bag with him & backtracked to find my missing part. No luck, but I added 3 extra miles to my day.

The road was full of tiny frogs. I suppose they must just have left their tadpole-tails behind. We must have seen over a thousand, and most had managed not to get run over. I did not want to squash any, which complicated my search for the mouthpiece. These frogs were about a half inch long. Very cute.

We came to a road I thought might be an option to take us to Fargo. We stopped to think it over and were lucky enough to attract the attention of a guy in a nearby house who was doing yardwork. He was dressed Rambo-style, t-shirt sleeves cut off, a bandana tied around his forehead, lots of dark hair. He came over accompanied by a big black dog. Of course, the dog only wanted to lick our hands, and the guy just wanted to give us useful road information. It turned out that the road we would have taken across towards Fargo is closed thanks to flood-caused reconstruction.

As he talked we heard a big rumble of thunder. That got me moving again. We didn't see any ominous clouds but we did hear thunder a few more times. Never saw lightning.

We stopped in a convenience store in Horace for a snack. Another startlingly different temperature. Bruce thinks he saw an indicator that said 62 in the store. By this time it was about 92 outside. I had to put on a windbreaker while I ate my sandwich. Back on the road one more time to cover the ten miles to Fargo.

Fargo doesn't look much like a city. I haven't seen any tall buildings, or even any concentrated downtown area. We came in through an area that is being developed with all sorts of shopping areas an apartments. All the streets we took were just variations - everything looks fairly new. We will spend a rest day here. I hope we can find a little more about the city's history.

This day reaches a couple of landmarks: it is our final day of riding in North Dakota.(we made it, Amy!), and we have ridden over 2000 miles. We are almost half way.

Miles today: 56
Total miles so far: 2016

2 comments:

  1. Congratulations on SO many fronts! Through ND, halfway home (well sort of), surviving heat and humidity - more of that to come, but now you know you can do it. Great milestones. Enjoy your day off.

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  2. I could just imagine 1,000s of little tiny frogs on the road and you skitting around them. thank you for the visual, Winnie, and congratulations on the landmarks!!!

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