Here it is - the first day of IARBGAR ! We will be spending the next week riding our bikes out to Rock Valley IA for the start of RAGBRAI, the register's annual great bicycle ride across Iowa !!
Today's route has us heading west out of town on Hwy C7X towards Garber, then heading northwest up to West Union Iowa.
Last night hotel and Guttenburg is called the Landing. It is right on the Mississippi River. There was a bicycle with floats on it out on the dock!
The hotel is an old factory that used to make buttons out of clamshells pulled out of the river. The owners son showed us how the old button punch machine worked, and there were examples of some of the buttons they made on the wall
Our first task of the day was to drop off Doc and Barbara's van at the RAGBRAI parking lot in the ball field south of town, where it will be sitting for two weeks while we ride our bicycles.
Next we stopped at a Casey's gas station for a delicious breakfast pizza, and then we were on our way!
As soon as we were out of town, Hwy CX7 started to go straight up - 2 miles (or 30 minutes) later we were up on a beautiful Ridge Road.
It was a beautiful road and the weather was perfect.
After about 5 or 6 miles, we started getting a northwesternly headwind. It started at 5 to 15 mph guests, but by the end of the day the gusts were up to 25 to 30 mph !
