54.02 mi / 3:39:44 time / 14.7 mph avg. / 22.0 mph max. / 1019 ft. climbing
Staying at Big Sioux State Recreation Area

Throughout all this rain, I’ve been rather surprised at how my spirits have stayed pretty high. Today, the cumulative load must have reached my breaking point, and I came down crashing hard for a while.

The evening was fine: cool, rain-free, and I got some good sleep. But then at 5am, the rain started again. Eventually I got up, pulled all my stuff out of the tent and over to the picnic shelter, and then dragged the tent over to take it down and try to dry it off a bit. All the drying and packing takes a bit more time, so I didn’t get rolling until around 9am.

The riding actually wasn’t bad, I had a nice tailwind, and even with the soaking rain, I did the first 25 miles without stopping. But when I stopped at Rock Rapids, the prospect of doing 60 more miles in the stuff was just too much, especially since I was then getting cold too. After drying out a bit under a picnic shelter, I went to the library to check out my options. By the way, that’s another bad thing about being wet all the time, it’s hard to go inside buildings without making a mess of them. I briefly considered just staying in a motel in town, but it looked like the rain might stop in the afternoon, so I got some Subway across the street. Another bad thing about being wet and cold in the summer is that most buildings are even colder inside than it is outside, even though it was only 68 degrees outside! So I left there as fast as I could and went back to the library for a final weather check and planning adjustments, and off it was in the mist again (it had lessened from the morning, so I was wet, but at least my shoes weren’t completely filled with water).

As I neared South Dakota, the rain stopped, and less than a mile from the border, the sun came out! It was as if Iowa was saying “wait, don’t go, we’ll stop messing with you, promise!” You know what? Screw you, Iowa! I’m outta here. But seriously, despite all the rain, it was a nice state to ride through, and I can’t complain about the favorable winds. I did it in about four days total, so I don’t know why those RAGBRAI losers are taking seven.

I got a spot in the state park along the Big Sioux River, rode into Brandon for some food and supplies, and given my short day, even had time to do a little mud-filled hike along and over the river (on a bouncing suspension bridge!) The skies have cleared up, so let’s hope that the weather reports are true and that South Dakota treats me a little more nicely.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 23rd, 2007 at 1:47 pm and is filed under bike. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.