Friday
Parkston SD to Sioux Falls SD
78 miles
Travel Time 7:30 hours
Saddle Time 5:45 hours
What a difference a day makes. Yesterday, with headwinds, took me 11 hours to get around 90 miles. Today, with no headwinds, 7.5hrs for 80 miles (including slow city traffic). Yesterday I was averaging around 10 mph on the road, today closer to 14. That 40% difference obviously helps. Plus yesterday I was dealing with horrible road conditions. For some reason the contractor that build rte 44 laid it down in strips. So very 10 yards there was a divot across the road. Thump thump. It was annoying, plus I figured it wasn’t good for my wheels. Thump thump. But the worst was that I couldn’t go fast down the hills because I couldn’t hit those holes at 25-30 mph THUMP THUMP!
Today, at mile 35 I pulled into the town of Bridgewater searching for a breakfast. The only restaurant doesn’t open until 11 and I didn’t want more gas station food, so I sat on the sidewalk and ate my fruit. Sure enough some people stopped to talk to me. While speaking with one person, an old lady pulled up and made small talk with us then unlocked the door to the closed grocery store I was resting in front of. She came out a few minutes later and handed me two cookies and wished me well on my “adventure”
Saw another rainbow this morning. Then biked thru a town my son Ethan would find comfortable to live in.
Who are these Soggy Ducks that arrive tonight? I have been fortunate to have three friends from business school whom I have gone camping, hiking, canoeing, sea kayaking, rock climbing, rafting, mtn biking, and outlet shopping with 24 times since graduating in 1990. Steve Kaufman, Michael Mitgang and Ken Oestreich and I have traveled to the Adirondacks, Canada, Mexico, California, Nevada, Texas, Utah, Colorado and probably some others I can’t think of right now. It all started the summer we graduated when we decided to climb Mt. Marci in NY. We were not prepared for that climb, and the park ranger even laughed at us. Well sure enough we turned around half way thru the attempt and ended up staying at an Econolodge and going outlet shopping the next day. But that failure motivated us to return the next year and conquer the mtn. And our tradition was born. How we came up with our name is a whole different story for another day. Each year we have tried to get do another trip, even though two guys live in NY and two in Menlo Park CA. Through weddings, divorce, parent’s deaths, 9 children, and an attempted adoption of a Rawandan child, we have gotten together. Even with Michael taking a two year adventure with his family on a sailboat and sailing down and across the Pacific while home schooling his kids, the ducks met him in Baha for a fun weekend.
This year was also a challenge. We decided to just lock into a weekend that they could all do and then they would fly to wherever I was. So here we are in Sioux Falls SD! Now what?
