June 27, 2018
Day 40 Wausau
Wausau,WI
110 miles (avg 13.6mph)
Rocked out this day! I know the mileage is crazy, but it was a seriously good day! We started a little before 6:30...Jon couldn’t get out of that place fast enough. We came out unscathed, no creepy crawlers or uncertain bug bites. Still though, not the best night’s sleep. We rolled through the Flambeau Forest and into the town of Phillips at 20 miles where we grabbed some breakfast sandwiches, playing “see no evil” with the ingredients list. Just south of Phillips, we stopped at the Wisconsin Concrete Park, an outdoor museum with embellished concrete structures built between 1948 and 1964 by Fred Smith, a retired lumberjack and self-taught artist. The sculptures were all life sized and larger, pretty amazing. Most of the human figures had somewhat of a Wallace and Gromit look to them.
After that we didn’t hit a town with any services for 50 miles. We stopped at a house at one point when we saw someone outside and asked for water. The woman was quite nice and even put ice in our bottles. We ate our protein bars while riding, as the deer flies were swarming and following us for a good 10 miles. At 75 miles we stopped at a park called Camp New Wood for a break (and no bugs!) We had considered camping here, but there really wasn’t much of a camping area there to speak of and we never did see the water pump. Nice park along the Wisconsin River though. After that we came to Merrill. We had intended to stop here after 90 miles, but we hit that town at 2:30 and we were both feeling pretty good. So we powered up with some Hydrate, an E-shot and an ice cream sandwich and decided to continue on to Wausau. Lots of rolling ups and downs, but we still made pretty good time, arriving at our lodgings at 4:30. Just as we were coming into town, Jon started having trouble with his rear derailer. He couldn’t shift up above the first 5 gears. By the time we climbed up a ridiculously steep hill for no good reason, he was stuck in 2nd gear. Well, good thing we’re in a city. He contacted our on-call mechanic and conferred. (Thanks Bryan Bell at K&G!!) Probably a broken shifter cable. Luckily, there’s a bike shop less than a mile away. Jon got a hold of them, 10 minutes before they closed, and we’re headed there as soon as they open tomorrow. So, that on hold, we tackled the next most important tasks. Laundry and food! Since the restaurant in the hotel isn’t open during the week, we walked a ways down the street to a Mexican street food restaurant. Jon ordered some sort of Mexican sandwich and I ordered a shrimp quesadilla. Somehow I ended up with a burrito. It took too long to get the order in the first place, so I took a bite. It was actually tasty except for some weird potato thing inside. I realized it was some sort of chicken burrito with fries inside! I gave those to Jon. It was really much better without the fries 😏 Bellies full, we waddled back up to the hotel. This place is quite interesting. Probably built in the 50’s, it has 4 floors and the rooms on the first 2 floors all face the indoor pool/courtyard area. (And it’s clean!) We crashed around 9:30. No hurry getting up, as the bike store doesn’t open til 9.
Today's ride: 110 miles (177 km)
Total: 1,544 miles (2,485 km)
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