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| This is our R1250 RT with custom seat. |
27 Sep: Hudson’s soccer game at 11:00 AM
26 Sep: 1:30 PM Jensen’s Restaurant
25 Sep:
24 Sep:
23 Sep: online Zoom call with Eric K
22 Sep: A Blessed Monday of rest and relaxation. Reservations are made for next week in Northwood. Our visiting plans are "coming together" in that everyone wants a different date and different time. Oh well, we love our friends and relations anyway.
21 Sep, Sunday: Ron had barely finished his exercises and eaten a bowl of cereal when Brett, Jenn, Hudson, and Holden showed up for breakfast at the Northern Taphouse (click here), a pretty good pub next door to the hotel. We thoroughly enjoyed our day with them, watching the kids running all over the farm where we picked apples, green beans, and raspberries. Then Brett drove us all the way downtown to the Minnesota Institute of Art, nicknamed, very inappropriately, MIA. Cynthia walked all over the farm without problem and lasted into the Museum before she suddenly ran out of steam and needed to leave in order to find food. Brett treated us to a lovely dinner and brownie ala mode dessert at the Boulevard (BLVD - click here).
20 Sep: After that one evening, we were back on the I-35 north to Medina, Minnesota, a NW Minneapolis suburb, to see Brett & Jenn, Hudson & Holden. This was again a quick day, 150 miles to the Country Inn & Suites, within 10 miles of their house, still undergoing remodeling. What a horror show the insurance company has put them through. We ate dinner at a good restaurant and invited them to join us for breakfast tomorrow. Route: I-35 to I-494 through the endless construction to the Carlson Parkway exit in Plymouth.
19 Sep: Serendipity strikes. We rode 100 miles east on I-80 to Des Moines to see cousin Sandy and her son Van. Sandy is still as sweet as ever but is really quite bewildered by all the things she now just doesn't understand. Cynthia was touched to see the role reversal in that Van is now very solicitous of his mother and takes care of her with patience and understanding. We then called Ray Mechem in Mason City and rode those 200 miles on I-35 north. Upon arrival, we called again and were invited over to see Ray and Dick (who we missed in Berthoud, Colorado) and their wives Mary and Fran, plus a bonus daughter (Malinda ?) and son-in-law.
18 Sep: Today we get to stay put for a change and visit friends. We did walk to the National Danish Museum (click here). That was a very interesting museum, and Ron particularly like the Danish pottery on display on the upper floor. It was also interesting to see the artifacts on shelving in the basement. Cynthia did better with the walking today and is feeling better. At 5:30 we returned to the Norse Horse bar for dinner with Deb, Karma, Barb and James. The women had one conversation, Ron and James had a different one about golf, airplanes and AI, but a good time was had by all.
17 Sep: We arrived in Elk Horn this afternoon at two. Good news: we enjoyed another great lunch at the Ruby Tuesday in Lincoln. It was great to see the Welcome to Iowa sign. This was a much more gentle day, only 167 miles. We didn't do a lot after checking in to the Hygge Inn but napped and then took a long walk around town to see the changes. Sadly, the town is losing much of the charm that it had when the National Danish Museum was located there. For Cynthia, the best part was to go to sleep early and sleep well.
16 Sep: Cynthia owes everyone email, but her hand complains. The sun is shining, we are fed and exercised, now to pack and ride for a thousand hours. We rode directly to a Ruby Tuesday restaurant in North Platte for a delightful lunch of veggies and greens. Today was less pleasant, hot and humid with more traffic, another 300 mile day. We are in York, Nebraska. … 866 miles in three days on I-80.
15 Sep: The weather has been grand! We were on that smooth road in Wyoming by ten AM headed for Nebraska. Cynthia’s back is good; Ron fed her ice cream every time she growled. We stopped in Sidney, Nebraska, two hours east of North Platte. After eating, Cynthia declared herself exhausted. The wind was a little less rough than yesterday, and the traffic was still light. Ron never expected two days on the super slab to be tolerable. It helped that Nebraska revoked its helmet law last year, so Ron was able to enjoy the wind whistling through his ears. 257 miles this time.
14 Sep, Sunday: Ron and Cynthia plan to depart "early" for Elk Horn, Iowa (click here). Since I-80 is the most convenient road to take from here, we will give it a try despite Ron's disinclination to spend so much time on the super slab. Let's hope it will be easier on Cynthia's back. The ride was long, 300 miles, and we arrived successfully in Rawlins, Wyoming at 5:30 PM. The ride was not as bad as expected since the traffic was less than expected, although the wind was quite strong and buffeted us constantly. The road surface was quite smooth, especially in Utah and Wyoming.
13 Sep: Ron intended to spend the day with Roy, but instead wrote postcards and watched political news until Cynthia woke up from a long afternoon nap. Ron then rode over to Roy's to spent an hour with him in his "man-cave" until time for Roy, Barbara and Ron to drive to the hotel to pick up Cynthia for dinner again at the Market Street Grill. Again we all enjoyed conversing with each other about church, genealogy, etc.
12 Sep: We were almost packed in Rangely when the earliest raindrops started falling at 10 am. We waited for 2.5 hours until the rain stopped entirely, quite unusual for the desert high country. We were so very relieved to be looking at Blue skies ahead for the first 30 miles to the town of Dinasaur but noticed a tongue of cloud reaching northward from a very dark southern horizon as we turned to go west. In Vernal, UT we stopped at a Subway to be sure that Cynthia had something substantial so many hours after breakfast. We managed to get out from underneath those clouds, but there were equally worrisome clouds above the mountains to the west, and those kept getting darker and darker as we approached closer and closer. We stopped in Duchesne at the Visitor Information Center where a lovely lady told us that the heaviest rain would be at Strawberry Pass but that it was sunny in Heber City and Salt Lake. Ron decided to hope for the best, but soon after we left Duchesne, we again encountered heavy rain and hail. This time the rain was not as blinding, but the hail stung Ron's face more severely. After ten minutes we passed through it, and Ron was much relieved although we were still climbing towards the actual pass. The mountain top was a lovely huge flat area with two or three huge lakes, quite scenic and worth the difficulty getting there that day. The descent from the pass was interminable through winding canyons to Heber City, and winding again down I-80 into Salt Lake City. We called Roy and Barbara immediately after arrival at our hotel, and they picked us up half an hour later for dinner at the Market Street Grill & Oyster Bar (click here), just a few blocks from our hotel. We all enjoyed lively conversation about church, genealogy, etc. Ron redid the graphs for Volume Three, and Cynthia sent corrections to the publisher.
11 Sep: Leaving Montrose on US 550 and then US 50 N, we turned on CO 92 E and started up Colorado Route 64 over Grand Mesa en route to Rangely, Colorado, but in ten miles we first encountered big heavy raindrops and spent no time in turning around and ran straight into a heavy deluge of blinding rain and hail for twenty minutes. Amazing that formerly dry conditions can be transformed so completely, so rapidly. This is Cynthia's first experience with hail; it makes quite a racket on her helmet. Ron doesn't wear a helmet, so the hail only brutalized his face. He back-tracked to Delta, CO and proceeded through Grand Junction following the GPS to I-70 West to CO highway 139 north to Rangely. It was a very interesting ride with rocky mountains, 15 MPH hairpin-turns, and occasionally threatening storm clouds. The hotel is nice, and we walked the length of town to Gio's, which restaurant served us nice salads and ice cream with caramel topping!
10 Sept: After breakfast Ron rode to visit Pat with a top case filled with recycling he could not unload in Pagosa Springs. Cynthia spent the day exercising her back, taking a shower and packing. Volume One is being printed. The Volume Three galley proof was not in color, had fuzzy graphs and had a mistake in labeling on one graph. Ron still needs to improve the index for Volume Two by deleting duplicative entries.
9 Sep: Montrose, Howard joined us for lunch at the Stone House and took us to visit the Ute Indian Museum, a very interesting place. Cynthia took a step off the boardwalk that was too big for her legs and pounded her back, and her sciatica is reminding her to not do that again anytime soon. Ron and Howard enjoyed an afternoon stroll through the riverside water park, but Howard decided not to stay for dinner so he could get home before the deer make driving dangerous for all concerned. Volume One is off to the printer. Yaay.
8 Sep: Ron planned an early departure for Montrose, Colorado, and we did get started about 10:30, which is early for us. We were surprised to find much warmer temperatures than the BRRRRR anticipated. Cynthia wore her heated gear that was totally unnecessary for the entire ride, although it did get cold going over the 10,000 foot passes. We intended to eat lunch at the Lone Star Cafe in Durango, but it was closed, so we ate at the Sidewalk Cafe instead. Dinner was at the Stone House in Montrose. The route was simplicity itself, US 160 W to Durango with a stop for lunch, US 550 N through Silverton to the "million dollar highway" to Ouray and continuing to Montrose and the Quality Inn just past Walmart.
7 Sep, Sunday: Ron received an e-mail with four absorbing interviews from his MIT reunion in April. Today is packing day! We walked early and spotted several deer. Dinner was at Boss Hogg’s at 4:30. We are so tired it is off to bed.
6 Sep: Ron worked on Volume Two and is making great progress. Our lunch was great. Cynthia is surprised at how much she loves broccoli with honey mustard. We had a delightful visit with a couple from Georgetown, Texas. We walked the neighborhood. Cynthia is finally writing overdue email to her family. Eleven grandchildren and thirteen great grands takes a lot of writing with one finger typing. She submitted dirty clothes to the washing machine. Her favorite word is clean.
5 Sep: Cynthia's box of mostly clothing was shipped back to Texas! We had a 76 minute walk to the lake and spotted six bucks and two had ten points. This was a successful day.
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| Cynthia achieved her goal of making it to the lake. |
4 Sep: At noon-thirty, we have walked the loop around the subdivision once. Cynthia has packed her saddlebag to see how much she can fit inside (not much!) Ron has completed his first pass thru the index and now needs to take recycling to the County Transfer Station. After feeding our faces, Ron rode to the recycling center with the mountain of recycling from the past six weeks, cardboard, clamshell plastics, etc. What a joy that they took it all. We walked in the evening for a total of 4.51 miles and returned to our motel to go back to work. Ron re-packed Cynthia's saddlebag and discovered that she can carry another outfit. He then packed the box for shipping things back to Texas and was amazed that the return box was smaller than the original.
3 Sep: On this gorgeous day in Pagosa Springs, the housekeeper has cleaned our room. Cynthia has bathed and eaten and is ready for her nail and pedicure appointment. Ron has been working on the index for Vol. 2. Life is very good despite that Cynthia tripped and fell on the trail to the nail salon. Every year so far, she has fallen once as we begin hiking; this year was no exception. We enjoyed a pasta salad with salmon dinner at Gustoso’s.
2 Sep: By evening, Ron finished the edits for Volume Two; next, he needs to proof the index and re-insert it. We slept beautifully, and we had a great walk with perfect 73-degree temperature under the most gorgeous blue sky. A mother deer and her “teenage” son ignored us as we passed by. With tonight’s second walk, we achieved a total of 4.35 miles, 10,929 steps.
1 Sep: Pritikin says. “You can eat ice cream on your own birthday, just not on everyone else’s birthdays.” We could not help ourselves since it is Cynthia’s third great-grandmother, Brynhild Olsdatter Gandrud’s birthday, born 247 years ago in Flaa, Norway. Right? Happy Birthday, Bestemor. The ice cream was delicious. The first day of September is beautiful. Ron worked on Vol. Two all afternoon. We accidentally sent Vol Three as an edit file instead of a .pdf; Barb caught it, and we submitted the correct file. Cynthia’s right hand is in a brace so she one-finger corrected some Brooks genealogy. We walked early and at 4:30 ate dinner.
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| Cynthia got a pedicure |
2 Sep: By evening, Ron finished the edits for Volume Two; next, he needs to proof the index and re-insert it. We slept beautifully, and we had a great walk with perfect 73-degree temperature under the most gorgeous blue sky. A mother deer and her “teenage” son ignored us as we passed by. With tonight’s second walk, we achieved a total of 4.35 miles, 10,929 steps.
1 Sep: Pritikin says. “You can eat ice cream on your own birthday, just not on everyone else’s birthdays.” We could not help ourselves since it is Cynthia’s third great-grandmother, Brynhild Olsdatter Gandrud’s birthday, born 247 years ago in Flaa, Norway. Right? Happy Birthday, Bestemor. The ice cream was delicious. The first day of September is beautiful. Ron worked on Vol. Two all afternoon. We accidentally sent Vol Three as an edit file instead of a .pdf; Barb caught it, and we submitted the correct file. Cynthia’s right hand is in a brace so she one-finger corrected some Brooks genealogy. We walked early and at 4:30 ate dinner.
