We had a late night last night chatting to Kathryn and her friend Tiffany, so with the time zone change as well we had a late start leaving at 0730 and heading to Perkins for a cooked breakfast of pancakes, bacon, eggs and hash browns with a rolling supply of coffee. We were out on the road by 0930.
A slight headwind resisted us all day, and the difference was marked from yesterday and the day before. We were around 4mph slower on the flat today. We set our sights on Medina where google informed us there was camping in the city park. We have decided to move away from the ACA route we have been following as it drops South 50 miles from the interstate and follows an arrow straight road all the way to Fargo. The shallow gradients of the interstate are far more appealing and letting the knees recover.
On route we encountered a large section of roadworks where the right lane and shoulder were being resurfaced. Initially we got to ride a few miles along brand new tarmac that was coned off from traffic, making it a dream to ride on. But as we caught up the the works the surface had been ripped up and we had to hug the side of the traffic lane, with lorries rolling past close enough to touch, inches from our panniers. We made it through in one piece though although not without a few close encounters. We took the next exit and bypassed the rest of the roadworks on a parallel road to Steele, where we had lunch at the service station. We aso picked up a Minnesota map here. 47 miles down, 30 to go.
The road was mostly flat for the last 30 miles but the headwind slowed us. There were some spectacular moments where we could see from our point on the road up to three miles of straight road extending to the distance, looking deceptively short. There would be an exit in the distance with a bridge, preceded by signs at one mile intervals so we could judge the distance.
We made it the 77 miles to Medina by 6pm and are now enjoying a dinner of spam and beans courtesy of Owen, who has been in charge of dinners.
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