Weather

Before we left I wrote that list of worries. I focused on cold. I spent a lot of time today debating whether cold or heat is worse. I still vote for cold, but that vote is being tested. A lot.

It was hard to get off to a good start today. The wild overnight weather made for a less than perfect sleep, and it was hard to feel sure that it was truly over. The TV in the hotel breakfast area covered local weather while we ate; there were minor flash floods happening all over the city. I wouldn't swear that I heard this right, but I am pretty sure there was mention of four inches. It was probably raining for less than two hours.

But we had to get moving. Thank goodness we had changed our itinerary yet again. With the modification we had to cover 59 miles today instead of 95. That was especially welcome when we realized that the wind was pretty strong, and would be in our faces most of the day. The temperature reached 95, the wind was mostly about a steady 15mph, the humidity was high although not at the steam room levels we experienced a couple of days ago.

The ride through Fargo was actually quite nice. We went through a large residential section with lovely shade trees everywhere. All good things must end, though, and the last couple of miles in Fargo took us through construction on an El Camino-ish road. Then across the Red River and into state #5.

Minnesota roads are not nearly as well maintained as are Montana's and North Dakota's, but they are not too bad. Bumpy but not risky. The first twenty miles or so were as flat as I have ever seen for such a distance. That, of course, allowed the wind easy access. And while none of the cars or trucks were aggressive, they didn't give us the extreme amounts of space we are now used to. It is actually quite surprising to see how quickly patterns change at state borders.

We soon came to Sabin. The guys at the bike shop had told us to be sure to check out the little store there. It has rows of sodas of all sorts. There must have been twenty brands of orange soda and even more types of root beer. Then there were all sorts of fruit flavors, even a maple syrup flavoring in one. There was also a nice variety of flavors of the local ice cream. We stopped for a little while.

Then we rode to the next town with a little shop (they are called "c-stores" here, meaning convenience stores, and the two we stopped at shared buildings and sales clerks but NOT entryways with liquor stores) and stopped and drank lots of Gatorade. Then we did it again. It was sort of hard to want food in the heat but Gatorade and lemonade and water and fruit all sounded great. And tasted great. I don't often say that about Gatorade.

By the time we reached the third and last stop, the terrain had changed a lot. Little hills began to appear in front of us. There were more and more trees. The lakes began to remind us we are in Minnesota. In fact, the very first lake that announced its name - so we knew it wasn't just another flooded field - actually had a loon swimming around where it could easily be seen. It's the state bird. Bruce even heard it call. We were soon in among lake resort communities. I guess we will see a lot of those. This is obviously a more populous state than we have seen since we left Washington. As much as we admired the huge open spaces, riding will be easier here. Lots more opportunities to find food and shelter.

We didn't need shelter today (although the air conditioned c-stores were very welcome). The storms stayed away. I'd made the mistake of looking at the Doppler radar picture in Sabin & there was a huge band of serious rain to the east. It either dissipated or went in another direction.

I will now stop this boring ramble about the weather. I do hope we will find energy to look beyond it and explore this lovely state. But for today it was very tough. This is definitely endurance riding.

Miles today: 59
Total miles so far: 2075