Sea to Sea week 6 megapost

OK, we had spotty internet access this week, so while I wrote a blog post everyday, I haven't had a chance to post them till now.  First, we had no internet access.  Then, the internet access was too slow for me to bother.  Then, I was having too much fun to spend time online.  Anyway, now I finally have internet which is sufficiently fast and am not otherwise occupied, so here's the breakdown of the week day by day!!

MONDAY

Day 34 Coralville, IA to Fulton, IL

Distance 161
Saddle time 5:59:51
Avg speed 26.7
Max speed 55.0
Totals ascent 878m
Total descent 861m

A nice quick century.  The ride today was actually 154km, but since I rarely ride that far on my own for fun, I did a couple loops once we got to Fulton to make it a century!  It was much second sub-six hour century (an alliterative achievement!).  I started riding with just Kaitlyn, and we jumped onto a pace line with two of the new riders, Kyle and Jason.  They are both strong, fast riders, and our average speed for the 75km we rode with them was about 30km/h.  However, I’m not really strong enough to maintain that pace, so after 75km (at about 100km for the day), we dropped back a bit.  Still, I was feeling good when we got to camp, so had no problem wrapping up the century.  I really wanted to get it done in under 6 hrs, so I was quite happy to make it with 9 whole seconds to spare!!!  We were served dinner by some of the local churches and it was a great day all around.  We also crossed the Mississippi river into Illinois today, so that was pretty neat!

Welcome to Illinois!

 

TUESDAY

Day 35 Fulton, IL to Shabbona, IL

Distance 142
Saddle time 6:14
Avg speed 22.8
Max speed 45
Total ascent 724m
Total descent 661m
 
What a difference a day makes!  From feeling good, great weather and a nice fast ride to slow legs, rain, and a difficult day.  It started raining just before we left camp today and rained pretty steadily most of the day.  It stopped for about an hour during the middle of the day, which was just long enough for our soggy coats to dry and for us to JUST start feeling warm before it started again and soaked us to the skin.  Top that off with some sore legs from perhaps pushing a bit too hard yesterday and it felt like a very very long ride.  Good thing I had some great riding buddies today (Kaitlyn, Katie, Malori, Adam and sometimes Eric).  Adam entertained us by giving us scenarios that we would have to figure out what happened (ie. A person is found dead in a room with a puddle of water…what happened?).  This took up a great deal of time (we were not very good at the game…) and made the miles go much faster.  Still, I was very grateful when we saw camp!  It’s supposed to rain tomorrow and it’s still a bit damp now, so I guess we won’t really get to dry out very much tonight.  Hopefully tomorrow evening we can dry off in Lansing!

Malori making her way in the rain

 

WEDNESDAY

Day 36 Shabbona, IL to Lansing, IL

Distance 154km
Saddle time 6:48
Average speed 22.5
Max speed40.8
Total ascent 435m
Total descent 529m

Another long day today!  154km felt really long after 2 long days already this week.  I decided to ride with my dad to give my legs a bit of a break.  Malori rode with us.  Not too much to report – we took it easy and had a nice day!  Hopefully taking a bit of a slower day will mean my legs will be a bit less sore for the rest of the week (Somehow I thought they would be at their max soreness by the end of week three but I seem to get more sore each day!!!!).  When we got to camp, someone told me the Vandijks were looking for me!  My Aunt Jo and Uncle Vince are here to visit us on their way to Minnesota!  Awesome!  We’re going out for dinner so that will be a nice change (not that I don’t love spaghetti…again…)!!! :P

Enjoying the bike path

 

THURSDAY

Day 36 Lansing, IL to Benton Harbor, MI

Distance 142km
Saddle time 5:45
Average speed: 24.3
Max speed: Garmin issues
Climbing: not too much, but Gramin issues keeps me from giving the exact #.

We passed through 3 states today!  We started in Illinois, then passed through Indiana, and arrived in Michigan!  I started the day with Amanda and Derek Deboer and Peter Wong, because the group I usually ride with (Katie, Kaitlyn and Malori, under the name “Blue Rodeo” because if we’re lost, we are lost together…) said they were going to ride really fast today and my legs are having issues with the daily 140+km rides.  However, it was a windy route through the city and on bike paths, so they ended up just riding normal speeds and I joined up with them at the first SAG because Derek was delayed by bike problems.

We had a great time: riding along the coast of Lake Michigan, pumping the tunes when we were on the bike path (Malori got a handlebar speaker from her boyfriend which we put to good use today) and stopping for delicious crepes in New Buffalo!  By the last 20 km, my legs were pretty much cooked again, but I made it to camp and am very excited for tomorrow, which is a paltry 95km!!  A big change from the long riding days we’ve had this week!!!

Welcome to Lake Michigan!

 

FRIDAY

Day 37 Benton Harbour, MI to Holland, MI

Distance 98.7
Saddle time 3:48
Avg speed 25.9
Max speed 45.2
Total ascent 425m
Total descent 434m

Started the day in the rain, again!!  We had a solid 1.5 hrs of rain before the skies finally cleared.  It was a good day of riding, though.  Just before we got to Holland, we had a stop at the first CRC church in North America, complete with a heritage museum.  It was a really interesting/informative stop.  We’re staying at Hope College in Holland, MI, which means we get BEDS(!!!) tonight.  We had a great afternoon at the New Holland Brewing company, and a nice short day tomorrow (only 60ish km!!!) .  Should be great!

Didn't get too many pics this day, but this one actually sums up our wet ride pretty accurately!

 

SATURDAY

Day 38 Holland, MI to Grand Rapids, MI

Distance 62km
Saddle time 2:39
Avg speed 23.5
Max speed 47.2
Total ascent 310m
Total descent 254m

We have arrived!  For those not familiar with the CRC, Grand Rapids is pretty much the Jerusalem of our denomination.  All along the route today we had people with signs cheering us on, giving us snacks and SAGs, and a great welcome into Calvin College!  We stopped about 3 miles before Calvin (a CRC College in GR) and gathered as a whole group.  It was pretty amazing to get to ride with 150+ cyclists through the streets of Grand Rapids to get to Calvin.  Once we arrived, we were greeted by Ken and Annelise Baker, good friends (but not relatives!) of my family, who drove my mom, dad and myself to Kalamazoo (where they live) for an excellent day of visiting, a HUGE soft real bed, a BATH, and a meal that was not prepared for 200 people (the food on the tour has been EXCELLENT, it’s just nice to have a change!!).  Tomorrow we’ll head back to GR for the celebration service and to prepare for another week of riding.  This Wednesday, we cross over into CANADA!!!!!!!!!  which I’m obviously super pumped about!

Getting our whole group ready to ride into Calvin together



My riding buddies for most of the week: Team Blue Rodeo (cuz if we're lost, then we are lost together...).  Most excellent riding buddies, indeed!