Hello again, dudes and chicks.  As the title of this post states, I'm going back in time for this month's mini-tour.  More literally, I'm also going back to Iowa.  That's the humble little mid-western state where I grew up, where I honed my bike riding expertise as a youth, and where my dad still lives.

My dad has cancer, though you wouldn't know it by looking at him.  He looks and acts like an exceptionally healthy 87-year-old dude, and he feels that way too.  He lives independently in the same big 19th-century house he's been living in for five decades.  Even so, he does have to go to an oncology clinic in Cedar Rapids for monthly treatments.  Unfortunately, Cedar Rapids is 70 miles from my dad's town and it's not safe for him to drive that far.  (That became very clear a little over a year ago when he caused a pretty bad accident, which he was lucky to survive.)

That's where I come in.  I've been driving down to Iowa every month to take him to those appointments.  It's a reality that precludes any multi-month bike tours for me, but the good news is that it has provided some great bonding time with my dad.  It has also, in a way, given birth to this idea of local mini-tours.  It's not ideal, but I figure a series of three-day tours is better than no tours at all.  Can you dig it?  Right on!

************

Here's where my ingeniousness comes in.  Since I'll be in Iowa anyway, I conceived a groovy plan to take my September mini-tour there. [See Footnote]  Basically, that plan involves extending my visit to include a couple days of riding in the land of my youth--what I like to call "the old country."  The land of agricultural enchantment.   The land where few bike tourists--or any other tourists--dare to go.  (Or care to go.)  I might even be able to debunk some more "Iowa is boring" myths as I've done on a couple of previous tours.  It'll be far out, man!

More specifically, my groovy plan is to explore some cool territory around and between the town of Oelwein, where my dad lives, and Iowa's oldest and grooviest state park.  That would be Backbone State Park.  My folks took me and my brothers there several times--not only from Oelwein, but also from the smaller town of Dyersville, where we lived previously.  I was in the 9 to 17-year-old bracket back then.  NOW is the time for another visit.  I'll be heading out next week.  Please join me . . . it should be a blast.

Heart

11

Comment

0

Link

Log in to comment or reply

Heart

11

Comment

0

Link

Log in to comment or reply

************

[Footnote:]  In case you're wondering, there is nothing in the Official Book of Mini-Tour Rules that requires me to begin and end every trip from my own home.  Quite the contrary, this journal is based on the very idea of touring differently.  Accordingly, this chapter will be different from the others.  The writing will be different.  The roads will be different.  The scenery will be different.  I will be different.  The plants and animals will be different because Iowa's corn, cows, and pigs are the world's best.  Iowa itself is different.

Most different of all will be the population profile.  Once I leave Oelwein, my route will take me through nine towns with a combined population of 3,700 residents.  That's seriously different from last month's mini-tour in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area.  For comparison purposes, I utilized some skills obtained from a freshman level statistics class in college and came up with an interesting ratio of peoplehood:  1:810

You got it--that's almost 1,000 metro Twin Citians for each northeast Iowan on my route.  Oh man, that's radical!