Marla served us a delicious breakfast at the Sunshine Cafe in Eldora. Since some raccoons chewed a hole in my water bag, I bought a 2 liter water bottle at a Casey’s (a popular gas station store here in the Midwest).
We found the trailhead with warning sign “Unimproved Trail” which was very accurate. We rode it for a few miles before we hit a sketchy bridge and we carefully walked across. We continued on the other side and saw what looked like a hippie bus. It’s “Team Love Shack” and they asked us to join them for breakfast burritos. They are a group of fun loving cyclists that ride in RAGBRAI each year as a team. About 10 of them came out to greet us and they gave us stickers, coozys and other schwag. They gave us a tour of their party bus and invited us to sign it. With so much positive energy, riding the next 10 miles to the tiny town of Liscomb seemed effortless.
While resting in a pavilion in Liscomb, three local boys came by to visit. The oldest (15), Kaulin, was into video games and his younger friend said “I like to play outside more” which made me chuckle. They told us about the parade later at 5pm and I was bummed it was only 1:30.
We rode onto Marshalltown and got some dinner food before continuing onto Melbourne. Unfortunately, the nice paved trail ended in Melbourne and we had to ride highway 330 to get to Rhodes, our destination. As planned, we rode the grass trail and found a secluded spot to set up camp.
Summary: we road 54 miles from Pine Lake State park near Eldora to the tiny town of Rhodes on unimproved trail, nice paved trail, and highway 330.
Hmmm, raccoons, my favorite. Be careful in the heat tomorrow…
Jon and I stayed in Eldora when we did RAGBRAI. We recognize that building! Also off that central plaza was a cool old theater that we were told used to be a Vaudeville theater. Fun that you are intersecting some of the RAGBRAI riders. Enjoy!
Glad you guys are reading the blog! Several people have asked us if we are practicing for RAGBRAI.