60 miles: stillwater, MN, to cambridge, MN

again the miles titling this post don’t match what i said we’d ride today. turns out the cue sheets again were askew. we ended up riding an extra 10 miles. fortunately, they were on a nice paved trail with tailwinds; that helped.

it was already warm when we left stillwater around 7:30, & it only got hotter from there. temps here in cambridge when we arrived early afternoon were in the lower 90’s.

we rode north on county road 4 from stillwater, which had quite a bit of traffic on it. but we had a nice wide shoulder, so it was easy riding.

after about 15 miles, we turned onto a beautiful trail along hwy 61. here you see laura & janet stopping along our trail. the little yellow flowers were an extra added attraction.

not long after i took this photo, the trail became heavily populated. there were some online skaters & a few bikers, but mostly nordic skiiers doing their warm-weather training for this winter sport. many individual skiers went past us, then i came upon this group with, i’m guessing, a coach. the coach told me that all the schools in the area offer nordic skiing; it’s a very big sport in this part of minnesota. these young folks seemed to really enjoy sailing along on their unusual skis/skates, pushing themselves with their ski poles.

a little further along, i took this photo to show the pretty gazebo along the trail. (that’s clark coming toward me.) the trail’s surface is really smooth, & everything is nicely maintained along both sides of the trail.

on & on we rode, finally coming to the end of the trail. we were hot & frustrated by that point, so were mighty glad to find an ice cream parlor alongside the trail … scoops was its name. 9 of us had root beer floats. i had a scoop of chocolate ice cream with walnuts, & clark had a scoop of some sort of cherry ice cream. no gourmet noon meals for us today!

we rode north on a very busy highway that had a nice wide shoulder, but only as far as harris … maybe 5 miles. there we turned west onto county road 10. for a while it was OK, but later the shoulders disappeared & the surface became very, & i mean very, rough. we were glad to take a break to visit with these horses, who came over to the fence to greet us. maybe they knew that laura works at a veterinary clinic in california, & they had a few little health problems to discuss with her.

our spirits lifted, we rode on, & soon came to cambridge. we negotiated 3-4 miles of a busy highway to get into town & to our nice motel here. since it was around 1:15 & we hadn’t had lunch, i asked the desk clerk for suggestions for local places to eat. 4 of us then followed her instructions for getting downtown. we found herman’s bakery, & each had a bowl of their delicious homemade soup.

linda, our fabulous cook, fixed us a cool meal for a hot day. this photo doesn’t begin to do justice to the array of scrumptious salads we enjoyed: a butter bean/hominy creation; the usual delicious mixed green salad; a chicken salad with grapes, celery, & pecans; a potato salad with chunks of egg; & a ham salad with green peas & orzo. we may not have had a gourmet lunch today, but we sure had a gourmet supper!

tomorrow we bike 77 miles (??) to little falls, MN. laurie says we have no trails tomorrow, but that our roads will again be the back roads that, like today, wind through the farmlands. that means, we think, that the roads will again be quite flat. & the weatherperson says we will again have tailwinds … & again hot temps. we’ll get an early start in hopes of avoiding the worst of the heat … & the increasing possibility of thunderstorms in the afternoon.