7/30 - minneapolis, st paul

a cup of chai and a muffin or scone at some cozy urban cafe.  as many of you know, that's the way i like to spend my mornings.  especially if i can get a 20 mile ride in before hand.  so today was pretty perfect.

the morning started with a light misty rain.  not enough to be a problem, but enough to keep temperatures down.  rode the river road in the rest of the way to minneapolis and found the dunn brothers cafe that jay had recommended to me.  found it in a renovated building in the old warehouse district.  i spent the next couple of hours drinking chai and writing posts.

then, back on the bike to head out of town.  i was going to ride along the river till i came to st. paul, but as seems to happen so often, the signage was terrible and i couldn't find the path.  so i aboandoned that idea and just headed east.  if you look at minneapolis/st paul on google maps, in bicycling mode, you'll see a plethora of green lines indicating bike paths and lanes.  there are a lot.  so i grabbed a combination and rode them out of town.

20 or so miles to the east is the st croix river.  there apparently aren't many places to cross the river.  in wisconsin it is frowned upon to bike on the interstate, so thaf leaves only the bridge at stillwater.  and as the only town with a river crossing, that turns stillwater into a tourist town.  one with a shop that advertises 'german heritage', i might add.  not to mention the prerequisite irish pub.  quite an active river town on a tuesday afternoon.  there were three river boats tied up, as well.

i hate to admit it, but i thought the state line was on the mississippi river, but i was wrong.  the line is  the middle of the st croix river.  around three o'clock, i crossed the bridge, climbed out of the gorge, and entered wisconsin.  seems that cigaretes and gas are cheaper here.  ah the rolling hills of wisconsin.  i forgot what hills were like.  these are pretty good ones, with mild grades that let hou get up a head of steam going down that carries you part way up the next rise.

of course it's still all fields.  corn, a lot of corn, soy beans and dairy farms.  25 miles of country farm road later, and i've arived at my warmshower host, steve o'rourke.  he lives in a trailer park.  we're talking northern european here:  german, dutch, norwegian.  the trailer park is very neat.  steve is a whole other post in itself.

and i'm tired and am going to bed.