Blow Ye Winds in the Morning

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Blow ye winds, hi-ho! Clear away your running gear and blow, boys, blow!

From a 19th century whalers’ shanty

Jeffrey met Kennedy in the quiet indoors.

Kennedy drives a shuttle bus from motels to the Mayo Clinic. He’s familiar with kangaroo courts from his native Kenya.

Kennedy wants to visit all fifty United States by 2025 and is only halfway. There’s time!

It wasn’t quiet outdoors. All day we faced a powerful SE headwind, and intermittent rain.

There were bright moments.

Zander, army vet and retired jack-of-all-trades, read our sign as he passed us in his SUV, stopped, and handed us a generous cash donation. Zander welcomes refugees. His great-grandfather’s family fled Pomerania to escape Jew-hatred.

Dan, the morning desk clerk in our motel, told Jeffrey that it’s legal to bike on US 52 south of Rochester. He said the 4-lane road becomes 2-lane a mile south of a particular on-ramp.

(The “cyclist” routes are miles longer and involve unpaved roads—see yesterday’s post for our take on gravel.)

Jeffrey suspended disbelief and pedaled us to the on-ramp.

Oops! A sign prohibits bikes (and presumably trikes). But we couldn’t read the sign until we were on the ramp. What were we to do then? Ride back the wrong way?

Wrong-way riding is dangerous and illegal. Whereas continuing was only illegal.

Jeffrey took the plunge. He pedaled furiously, passing Zander (we exchanged happy hello waves), who had stopped to help a motorist change a tire.

We made it!

What a relief to be on a 2-lane road with bikeable shoulders!

Two hours later, Jeffrey stopped in Chatfield for peanut butter and jam. Outside the supermarket, he met Lorrie.

Lorrie is an analyst for the business side of a large medical center. She doesn’t follow the news; she doesn’t know whom to believe. But she believes in human rights.

Lorrie will follow our journey. (So can you.) She intends to support Human Rights First. (So can you.) And she gave Jeffrey a handshake and a hug. (So can you.)

Downtown Chatfield
Limestone layers south of Chatfield
The town of Fountain painted a bicycle on its water tank.
“Amish Byway” means wide shoulders the rest of the way to the Minnesota state line … and dodging “horse apple” deposits.
The horse did a double-take at us.

There was no “Welcome to Iowa”. Just a marker for Winneshiek County.

And an instant change of paved shoulder to smooth little round stones that bike tires can’t grip.

We had to pedal with only two wheels on the narrow paved shoulder. The left wheel was on the motor lane.

Jeffrey soon tired of testing fate with passing motor vehicles.

We took a break from US 52 on parallel side roads, one of them 3 miles (5 km) of loose gravel. The detours added miles, slowed us down, and we always were led back to US 52.

The first Iowan we encountered today.
The next Iowans we encountered: Dan and Parker pulled over and leaped from their truck.

Dan: “We saw you earlier in Fountain!” (42 miles ago.)

We had a cheery talk.

Among other topics, Parker told of a former girlfriend, a Nicaraguan, who had a tattoo. According to Parker, the then-president said that no Nicaraguan with a tattoo could get a job. If that isn’t quite true, it’s in the spirit of recent times. It shows that Parker knows that most “criminal invaders” are neither.

On a side road, Tom stopped to hear what we’re about and to share some local lore. Tom (holding our calling card) and Jeffrey have a mutual Decorah friend, Erik, whom Jeffrey knows from his university days.

Motel owner Rina took one look at bedraggled, shivering, wobbly Jeffrey, handed him a towel, and checked us into a warm dry room.

Rina is an American patriot. She loves our country, and sees where things (such as our treatment of immigrants and refugees) need repair.

Jeffrey planned a long southeast journey for tomorrow.

If the SE gales persist, we will reconsider in the morning.

4 thoughts on “Blow Ye Winds in the Morning”

  2. You are ‘on the road’ for Justice! – There’s a rush for justice for immigrants but not for being on the road. You two take your time and keep talking and pedaling when you can. You’re GREAT!

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