I had a good time in Madison. I ate great food, going out to eat (or one night ordering pizza in) every night while I was there, budgets be damned. I rested up and took care of a few things. I spent much of one day to wander around the university campus, enjoying the bike trail along the lake, the gardens, an art museum, and an impressive view from "Picnic Point". It was a good three days off.
But this morning it was time to get back to it. Zac was awake until the early hours of the morning out with a friend in town for a conference (I bailed on them early to get some sleep) and he was sound asleep as I got breakfast and got around. I ultimately couldn't bring myself to wake him, so I just left a note on a napkin, along with his spare keys, and headed out. It was a relief that my fully loaded bike fit in the elevator.
Since I had heard it was well worth seeing, and since I figured my parents' might appreciate it considering they go to the one in Lincoln to sell their art every week, I stopped in briefly at the farmer's market, right on Capitol Square. It's impressively large. I didn't feel I had the time to see much of it, and even at 7 in the morning it was already getting busy, but I at least got a sense of the scale. And I bought a giant cookie from a guy who looked like a Mennonite. I saw a woman in underarmour and struck up a short conversation with her about the market. She asked the standard where I was from and where was I going. I told her about my Warmshowers stay in the outskirts of Milwaukee tonight and she told me she was a Warmshowers host herself. Then on the way out of town I passed a guy loading up his road bike. He promptly caught up to me, and asked me about my tour. I told him, then asked about his. He's headed for Niagara Falls (which hey, so am I, eventually). ...And his starting point was three blocks back, where I'd first seen him. I'd literally seen him start his tour. He quickly zoomed on ahead, needing to make damn good time to catch the ferry in Milwaukee in just 5 hours. But then stopped at a stoplight, he asked if he could take my picture. I said it was fine as long as I could eo the same. So we both have pictures of the other taking a picture of each other. I love Madison, such a cool city.
Before long I got on the Glacier Drumlin trail. It was nice, very flat, gravel but well maintained, beautiful scenery, passing rivers, marshes and woods, and full of critters, rabbits, ground squirrels, and grey squirrels. It's funny seeing the difference in their reaction to me, the rabbits standing perfectly still in hopes I don't see them, the ground squirrels darting out of the way, and the gray squirrels running INTO the way more times than not. I was loving the day, happy to be back to the adventure.
...Then the rain came. I saw it coming, and I got the rain cover on my trunk bag on in advance of it. But after the start-stop downpour reduced to drizzle back to sun that I've seen so much of lately, that was what I was anticipating. As it began to actually rain, I took shelter (as much as there was) under some trees on the bike path, along with my booties I put on my rxl bontrager jacket rather than my full-on, utterly unbreathable rain jacket, thinking that just as in time before my big concern would be balancing dryness with not overheating. ...I won't say I made the wrong choice...but I will say that my jacket ended up soaked through before the end. I kept looking for the rain to stop, the clouds to clear, and the sun to come back and dry me out. And my hopes remained ever unrealized. The path turned from nice gravel to slushy mud, typically covered in pooling water. All those ground squirrel holes along the path became more dangerous than previous mere nuisance as they would be somewhat hidden by the water and my water-beaded vision.
Eventually, Bree and I both a mud-soaked mess (which you only ever fully realize when you stop somewhere), I abandoned the bike trail near Sullivan in favor of the highway. I stopped at a gas station in Sullivan to use the bathroom then buy some token junk food item. I asked the lady at the register whether it was supposed to stop, and with the least sympathetic voice I've heard, she told me it was supposed to continue all day. It abated for a moment going into the gas station, then started again full force as I left it. Despite the highway doing some inefficient curving (which at the gas station I could finally check my phone without fear of harm to find out), I stuck to it to avoid more mud. I stayed on it for a number of miles until suddenly I saw a paved path emerge to the right of it. It took me a moment to realize that was in fact the bike trail. I didn't have to think twice, walking my bike through the ditch to get over to it. Somewhere between where I left it and here it had become paved (I later learned at Dousman, about 6 miles out from Sullivan, maybe 8 or so from where I was). I asked a cyclist coming the other direction (as I now started to see a few other fools in the rain, having not seen a one on the gravel after the rain began) if it stayed paved and he told me it did.
Things got better after that. The rain let up, then stopped. Though it remained cloudy so I was never able to really dry out. I got to the end of the bike trail, then did a decent job navigating some streets, even ignoring Google in favor of a more direct, though busier, route. Until at last I reached the end of the road for the day, my hosts coming out to greet my wet and dirty self as I arrived in their driveway. I felt a little bad because of course Bree was my first concern over any kind of socializing. They were understanding though, provided me with warm water and shop towels to clean her up. Then while Deborah went to the store, Dave came out and chatted with me while I cleaned, and even got the hose for me so I could hose off my very dirty panniers, trunk bag, booties, and even camelback. I had been a real mess. I got my shower, got laundry going, hand washed my jacket and put it to dry, and then finally was in the place to freely socialize.
They're cool people. Dave is a bike frame builder, originally from New York, had been working in Waterford, now works for himself making custom frames. Deborah has done some serious world traveling. And the two of them are planning their own trip around Lake Michigan starting just next week. Which meant they had lots of questions about my experience and my stops and all of that (though not all of it is applicable since they plan to do a more standard, lake hugging route). They're also doing an organized ride in Oregon, and we found out with their loop that they should be able to check out Sisters Rock and Otter Point, two of my favorite places on the coast. There was good food, good conversation (on politics and other such things too, not just touring), even an ice cream bar before an early trip to bed. It was a nice end to a very wet day. Ride through it, and it always gets better.
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