Relay for Life, RAGBRAI, Biking and Painting.....

Hit Bridge City Friday night for the Relay for Life. Ok, let me just say this is a very cool and moving experience. If you have never been a part of it you should help or donate luminaries ($10.00 a bag) in honor of a survivor or in memory of a loved one.

The Yankton group has a great venue down at Riverside Park along the Missouri River on the walking path. The path gets lined with the luminaries of survivors and ones that have passed away from cancer. After all the luminaries are lit they have a local guy lead a lap while he plays the bag pines. WOW, it is so powerful. I was told this year there were 106 survivors that walked and last year their was 101! Very cool the there was on increase in number and I am proud to say that my Godparents are two of the survivors!

It was so very hot down there and humid at the park we decided to make a slight detour to the Ice House for a couple cold ones. As it turns out a few of us had the "Champagne of Beers", Yup, Miller High Life. I have been into trying the retro-beers so this was fun. Not sure if you know about the Ice House but it has a long tradition and you can read about it here. Very fun evening. The picture below shows us at the Ice House from LtoR me, Rose, Kris, Joan and Luther with their survivor shirts on.

Saturday we got the newer beverage (beer) fridge switched over and filled up. She is looking real good! We did some painting and then headed out of town to Missouri Valley to meet up with my sister and brother-in-law. Of course I am sure a few of you know that this was the start of RAGBRAI (Registers Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa) this year. Kris had never seen this before and she was AMAZED. If you have never seen it there is nothing like it. There are tents, bikes, buses and people EVERYWHERE! Any spare open ground has tents on it. It is like a giant moving city of 10,000 (I think) that moves everyday! Saw some neat things. Cannondale and Trek had their own booths that you could "rent" one of their bikes to ride for a day in the tour. Really cool bikes that they had to rent also. I am sure they hope the "rent" would turn into "buy" but still a good way to promote their products. Cliff Bar challenge had a fun booth with free samples and stickers. They also had an interesting bicycle with what looked to have its own generator on it to power whatever. (see pic below) I think it was the Trek booth that had this very interesting weight to hold up their canopy. The bucket was full of old pedals! (see pic below).

We buzzed over to a place for supper before heading out into the NASTY WEATHER! There was a line of bad storms moving through the area on Saturday night and we got caught in a pretty good down pour for about 10 miles. Got home around 11:30pm and hit the sack!

Sunday I painted the walls in the bathroom and then I ventured out for a bike ride while Kris finished cleaning up and doing some more trim work painting. I headed out of Yankton on old hwy 50 to Mission Hill and headed north to valley view. Lets just say this part of the ride was not fun as it had just been "chip sealed" with the pink crushed rock. It made for a noisy ride and I ended up with some tar on my water bottles, plus I forgot to put on sun screen so my arms are a little red. Hit Valley View and headed east to Volin and then took the lower bluff road to the road that heads south to Meckling where I met up with Kris in Toby's parking lot, 27.03 miles, loaded up and headed to Sioux Falls. We then met a friend that was in town from Colorado. It sure was good to see her and her life is going in a different direction. I think she is the happiest I have seen her in a LONG TIME! YOU GO GIRL!

So as you can tell it was a busy weekend and I am bushed today.

I forgot to tell you all that I am an owner of another Cannondale bike. My brother-in-law gave me his old Cannondale from the mid-late 80s for parts. It has Shimano components and my Cannondale has Suntour which is not made anymore so I can switch parts over to mine if I like or whatever I want to do with the bike. I will have to ponder some thoughts about it yet and see what can be done. Kind of fun adding to the stable! THANKS STAN!