This morning we were treated to one of the nicest breakfasts of the trip. A plentiful supply of a bread and butter pudding style bake with mountains of fruit, bacon, syrup and coffee! This helped wake me up better than Gizmo's repeated headbutting to the face at 0630 (no hard feelings Gizmo).
Tom kindly offered to escort us out of the town to the trail, swinging by to meet Rob at Beloit College who had a few mementoes from Wisconsin for us. Tom and Rob were the first to notice our exercise logo on our jerseys with the dragon, unicorn and lion. We departed the college, and Tom took us to the trail head. Golden Finches (thank you Tom for identifying them) darted alongside us while we rode.
Today was mostly along crushed limestone paths and county road sections in between. A Southwesterly wind meant we alternated between headwind and tailwind all day as we went South then East along the gridded county roads. 46 miles by lunch in Sycamore, with most of the hard work done for the day; The rest was all cycle paths.
We took the Great Western Trail to St Charles, crossing arching wood bridges and meeting a few nice groups who would inquire as to our destination. It was always fun seeing their double take in our rear view mirrors when we replied "New York!"
From St Charles it was a scenic path down Fox River where a local cyclist, Paul, met us and as we were going his way opted to stay with us, chat and escort us to Aurora. Paul was Italian in origin, and has family there in the South. We spoke of Italy, in particular Venice, and Hawaii which is like a second home to him and is somewhere I would like to visit. We split ways at Aurora, thankful for the local knowledge and the opportunity to switch off to an extent and follow a local rider.
A final bike path took us straight to Peter Taylors' house. Peter is a family friend of Owen who kindly offered us a place to stay for a few days while we rest in Chicago. Owens' family is also here, who Jake and I first met on our training ride, and it is nice to see some familiar faces. Plenty of photos and home video, while we told stories of our trip and heard about their experiences here in Chicago over the last week.
Tomorrow we are looking forward to a whole day without cycling! (The first in 36 days).
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