Jen and Rebecca Have a Parting of the Ways, AKA Day 3 of RAGBRAI XXXVII

R: As we packed away the Tent-Mahal in Greenfield, it was cloudy, but not actually raining. We were thankful for this, but we weren't overly optimistic about the day continuing rain-free for long. It was a relatively pleasant ride to the first town of Orient, 9 miles in, where we stopped for breakfast. We both got big cinnamon rolls and juice and then happened to run into Janelle's parents finishing up their pancakes. Still no baby at this time, as we confirmed with the grandparents-to-be (technically, their 4th grandchild). I wasn't sure we'd ever run into them while on the ride, knowing them to be early-risers and not town-lingerers, but I guess we were prompt that morning in our own departure time or something. It was fun to chat with them briefly. Sadly, as we left the high school gym to get back on our bikes, the rain had already begun...with 68 miles left to go for the day.

J: The next town was 12.7 miles away and it was possibly the longest 12.7 miles I’ve ever ridden in my life. That’s because weather changes and I don’t always play well together. And today was no exception. The migraine was slowly building before Orient and by the time I got to Macksburg, I wanted to cry (oh wait, I did). So, I made the tough decision to give up the ride for the day and take the SAG wagon into Indianola. For those unfamiliar with RAGBRAI and other long organized bike rides, the SAG wagon is essentially a van with a trailer that takes riders into the next town with a repair shop (for those with mechanical issues) or into the finish town (for those who are physically or mentally unable to ride the rest of the day).

But before Aaron and Rebecca left me to continue on with the day’s ride, we saw the most awesome of small town Iowa games – the skillet toss!

R: Yes, folks, that’s right. Macksburg featured a rousing skillet toss game. The object: knock the basketball head off of a stuffed dummy using an iron skillet from 10 (maybe more) yards away. As we walked up, one skillet came flying out of the enclosed cage in which the competition was happening—no top to the cage, It was quite a crowd-pleasing event! Plus we got to see the Bananaman toss a skillet.

R (continued): Aaron and I proceeded without Jen. It was still cold and still rainy, though not raining nearly as much as before. We stopped next in East Peru. Even though it is apparently home of the original delicious apple, I didn’t have an apple. I did, however, have a pork tenderloin sandwich. And, it may (or may not) be interesting to note, that the town is pronounced “Pee-roo” so I took the opportunity of peeing there.

R (continued): Our day’s ride also took us through Madison County, famed for its covered bridges. St. Charles had a fake bridge on the street, and I was feeling a little disillusioned that they were just taunting us with a fake one and we wouldn’t be seeing a real covered bridge on our RAGBRAI route. But there was one waiting for us just outside of St. Charles. We didn’t stay longer than a photo op, though, since we still had 30 miles to go. I didn’t even walk all the way across!

R (continued): The sun finally came out and I finally took off my jacket in time for our last 15-mile push into Indianola. The route planners saw it fit to have us enter Indianola by climbing the steepest two (or maybe three?) hills we’d yet seen. And then my campsite was on the complete other end of town. But fortunately Jen already had the tent put up when I arrived! One of the benefits of sagging--at least it benefited me.

J: That’s right, I was Rebecca’s tent girl on Tuesday. Although, really, I just wanted a place to sleep off my headache while I waited for my friends to ride in. I had an excellent two-hour nap and woke up feeling significantly better. After Rebecca got in and cleaned up, we headed into town to find Simpson College (Grinnell had kindly sponsored the night’s dinner at the college. Thanks Grinnell!). While be both knew that our campsite was on the edge of town, I don’t think either of us realized that it would take us so long to actually get back to the center of it. And we were under a deadline! We had 30 minutes to get to the dining hall and well over a mile to walk. Never fear, we made it – and each managed to consume the equivalent of two dinners and desert! After dinner, we met up with Aaron and Matt, sent out our last timely blog entry and then went to enjoy the beer garden.

R: As a side-note, in true Grinnell fashion, while walking down the streets of Indianola trying to get to the dining hall by the 6:30 closing time, I ran into an alum with whom I’d been in Grinnell Singers who was not riding with our team (and in fact was not riding RAGBRAI at all. He’s living in Des Moines and had come down to see other friends who were riding. Oh, writing this up reminds me to look him up on Facebook!) Not sure he would have recognized me if I’d not been wearing a Grinnell t-shirt. Glad I have a ton of them in my wardrobe to create more random Grinnell run-ins on the street. Oh, and the dining hall decided to stay open as long as they had food left, so our rushing wasn’t even necessary, though we slipped in under the wire at 6:29!