Day 33 - Wed, June 11 - Rest Day in Champaign, IL - 0 miles

This is our rest day in Champaign, IL. My wife, Kim, is visiting for the day. Above is our new personalized license plate that we received this spring. Iowa just started issuing these "Share the Road" plates for those who wish to purchase them. Part of the fees go towards bicycle safety education.

Kim and I are just taking it easy today. We had an extended breakfast in the hotel lobby while visiting with other riders. We then rested some and then had lunch at Red Lobster. After lunch we walked several blocks to WalMart to stock up on my supplies for the next seven-day riding period and then browsed in Borders Book Store for a while. We had a headwind while walking back to the hotel so I suggested we should call the sag wagon. Kim didn't think that it was necessary.

We rested more during the afternoon while watching the Iowa flooding reports on The Weather Channel. Some locations are experiencing worse flooding than they had during the great Iowa floods of 1993 - a very disastrous year in Iowa. Kim called home to check with her sister who is house and dog sitting for us while Kim is gone. Everything is still okay in Grinnell. They've been getting lots of rain, but no flooding, yet. It is looking like Kim will be driving back to Iowa in storms tomorrow - which she isn't looking forward to.

An item of interest - the sliced tomato salmonella food poisoning outbreak which is sweeping across the country was apparently the cause of our problems in New Mexico. It is reported that the outbreak first began in New Mexico and Texas in early June. Several of the reported hospitalization cases included members from our group.

Kim and a couple of other riders have gone to a Yoga class this evening. Some of the riders try to find classes to attend on our rest days and Kim attends Yoga classes at home. I've been using the time to prepare for our ride to Crawfordsville, IN, tomorrow morning.

Champaign, IL, is the home of the University of Illinois and also of Bonnie Blair, the famous Olympic speed skater of a few years back.

Thanks for the comments,

Bob

Day 32 - Tue, June 10 - Springfield, IL to Champaign, IL - 87 miles - 2100 feet climbing

Today started out to be an 87 mile ride to Champaign, IL. It grew by 8 miles, making it 95, before the day was over as we had to detour around two bridges that were closed due to flooding.

The day started out calm as these smokestacks in back of our motel show - the vapors are drifting straight up. Fifteen mile tailwinds did develop for the day which made the long ride very pleasant and even faster than our fast century ride of yesterday. Randy and I averaged 16.0 mph for the entire day. Randy also had two more flat tires and so plans on putting on two new tires during our rest day in Champaign tomorrow. His tread has worn down to quite thin.


Twenty-seven miles to Champaign - but just up the road we had another bridge-out detour which added another 1.5 miles. Not far back we had a 6.5 mile detour around another bridge-out.


Our roads today were much like our roads back home with no shoulders but low traffic.


Mike from England taking a break at a Casey's gas station. We have three Casey's stations in small-town Grinnell.


Brendan from England rolling in for a break at Casey's.


Most of us stopped at a very nice bike shop on the edge of Champaign. Here is Clark one of our staff members also stopping to browse.


The bike shop had a women's clothing and accessories department which was very popular among the women riders.

I recently asked my hometown bike dealer why he didn't have many men's cycling clothes but lots of women's. His reply was that men don't buy bike clothes.


George from England modeling some of the newly purchased women's clothes. The women also had mail-order packages of clothes waiting for them at our Champaign rest day motel. The women riders cannot understand how men can wear the same clothes day after day - we do wash them daily.

Tomorrow will be our rest day in Champaign. My wife, Kim, arrived at our motel shortly after I did - having driven over from Ft. Madison, IA, where she had spent the weekend with childhood friends. Kim grew up in Ft Madison.

Bye for now and thanks for the comments.

Bob