Alexandria to St Josephs, MN
Bill and I rode from Alexandria, MN to St Joseph's, MN today—65 miles on the Lake Wobegon paved Rails-to-Trails trail. Both of us have decided that trail riding is monotonous and tiring because there is so little variety in the terrain and scenery and so few places to eat or get a cold drink. Pretty flowers and farms all along, however, and many mousies and ground squirrels darting across the trail today.
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| Red berry elder at trailside |
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| Prairie Clover at trailside |
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| Picnic area beside the trail |
We stopped in Osakis, MN, a small town just off the trail where Bill had spent a part of his childhood as his dad worked in the oil equipment supply business. At a hardware store here, Bill bought some foam rubber pipe sheathing to cover and cushion his handlebars. His right hand and arm are still quite sore. I took quite a few pix of Bill in this town in which he was having a nostalgic reunion.
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| Bill meets an old timer who shares memories |
We have also decided that MN is not welcoming to campers. This is our second night without showers. We heated some water last night at Big Ole Park and took bucket baths in its new washhouse, which had changing rooms but no showers.
Today we talked to the St Jo’s police and those in the C of C only to find that they know nuttin’ about the town in which they serve. The police told us to go to a campground that was 13 miles away; the C of C lady told us to go to Westerman City Park where they allowed camping. Well, Westerman did allow camping but was terrible—infested with mosquitoes, horrible pit toilets, no sinks or running water in the bathrooms, and a couple of homeless guys camped out there. We called all over, but it was the only choice, so we reluctantly put up our tents and cooked dinner.
After dinner we made a run to a nearby CS for Bill’s breakfast o.j. and banana. Ducked into a pocket park on the way and found immaculate bathrooms with hot water and flush toilets. We immediately took a U-turn back to our Westerman campsite and tore down. Moved to the pocket park (Centennial Park), re-erected our tents behind the washhouse because we're probably illegally camping here, reorganized our gear and then . . . found that the bathrooms locked automatically at 8! We were left with NO bathrooms at all. Our day seemed a comedy of errors.
Examples: I threw out my stinky sandals yesterday and bought a cheap pair of ugly shoes at Wally World. This evening when I went to push in my tent stakes with the toe of my shoe, the stake went right through the sole and (fortunately) between my toes. The picnic table at W’man was poured concrete, the top at least 6 inches thick and not positioned correctly with the bench. Both of us bruised our thighs each time we stood up. Then when we went to set up again in Centennial Park, I was pounding in my stakes with the sole of my bike shoe (off my foot) and the stake went right through the cleat slot. Dum de dumb dumb. The shoe required a little operation but all is well and fixed now.
Good news: Called Rick this evening. He will not need surgery on his broken arm. He saw his orthopedic doctor and got a new brace and is more comfortable than with the old one.
While sharing a quart of beer before bed, we plotted tomorrow’s route. We will head for North Branch. Will not get to visit with our friends in Minneapolis as this would require deviating from the route and riding through Minneapolis and St Paul metro areas. Something we are not keen to do.
It is now 7:30 am and I will bring this up to date. It rained all night and is still raining hard. We set up breakfast in the pavilion here and have packed up our wet tents and soggy gear, but we’re waiting for the rain to slack off a bit. I biked to a BP Station two blocks from here to use their bathroom and brush my teeth. Got as wet as though I’d jumped in a swimming pool. Probably won't make our 70 miles today as it is supposed to rain all day.
I’ll send this when I find a phone and report later on our day. I have been distracted from finding a phone—something that has become rare with all the cell phone use—so you will probably receive all three reports together.
[I am composing these messages on a little Pocketmail email device--precursor to laptops and cell phones. After I compose the message on a small keyboard with my thumbs, I dial a toll-free number and hold the device up to the phone. It sends the message to a server which then sends it to my home email. It also sends me all the email from my home addresses. In 2010, the Australian company that provided this simple but effective Pocketmail service went out of business and pay phones and land lines were becoming obsolete with the advent of the cell phone.]
