Heavy dew at wake up time.

Plan today is to ride the rest of the Cuyuna trails, do my wash, take a shower, grocery shop, then drive a good ways towards Medora, ND. It all worked. Plus I listened to the Mariners game on XM to hear Felix’s perfect game. One of only 23 such games in baseball history.

I rode from camp on  trails I rode yesterday. I crossed the highway to the more technical trails. More examples of well designed and built trails. Shorter length here. Someday i will really learn how to G out the bermed turns. saw 2 riders.

Amusement park riding. The trails are fun to ride. If only the CCC set out to build their trails this way the country would have miles of these kind of trails and I would wonder what a technical feature was.

The couple i met on the trail told me Crosby has a laundromat. I supported it.

Yesterday I encountered a solo 40ish woman riding a rim brake bike. She was beaming from her ride. She was an advocate b4 the trails were built. Local. She at first doubted her ability to ride yet she bought her bike. She surprised herself and is digging on her work. The couple I met today were locals just new to riding because of the local trails. Great to see all these riders using the trails and prolly doing some business in town.

Clean clothes, my wash day is predicated on 6 pairs of liner shorts. Six days since last Wed. 6 out of 7 days riding. The clothes line at the bed head board is filled up w/ drying bike clothes.

I caught a shower @ Crosby park.

Grocery shopped @ Cub Foods in Brainerd.

Headed west driving back roads. Drove thru a windy rain storm. Rain quit but wind remained strong from the NW, sometimes on my nose.

Made FT Ransom SP south of Valley City. Chilly night. Camping here for the night.

I have my 6 month dental session w/ my dentist in Spokane on Sept 12. I will prolly travel thru MT catching rides some of which I have previously ridden.

Tomorrow is Medora, ND. Find that on your map. Dakota bikes has worked well for me in procuring tires. 2 day delivery from QBP in Minneapolis.

Today I spent hours wandering around on th Cayuna Lakes IMBA Ride center trails. This place used to be open pit iron ore mines along w/ natural lakes. I met 2 ladies who were instrumental in making the trail system happen. Lots of years behind the scenes advocacy. The trails were built in 2010, opened in 2011 as a ride center, the first IMBA center. Machine cut very well engineered. Trails are mostly on strip mine over burden. Dirt and rock is red from iron oxide. Place was mined until 1957 w/ reclamation efforts in the 80’s. Ride over loose pieces of rock that sound like an iron plate casting. excellently signed on the ground and mapped. At major intersections there was a large trail map w/ your location noted. Many trails are direction specific. I rerode several trails because I forgot it the first time or on the way back the trail I wanted to ride was closed because of storm damage.

red dirt stained the board walks:

Trail went by a natural lake. I was chatting w/ 2 old guys riding Huffy’s in blue jeans and flannel shirts, no helmets. I heard a loon make 2 calls and that was it. The remaining animal sound on my list I want to hear is a wolf.

The trails for mountain bikes has increased visitor traffic and increased local commerce. Tourism is an economic engine.

Tomorrow I will ride the more tech trails @ another lake location. Then head towards North Dakota.

Squashed butt.

Quite night, a little rain fell.

Today I had a 3 hour drive to Minneapolis to Shockspital for fork service. Appointment was 11:00AM. Using the GPS route I arrived just a few minutes early. I wheeled my bike in to the waiting tech. Short story is the oil leak is from the guts that he can’t fix. He did replace the oil w/ correct amount which is less than what was in it. As a result my fork sits higher w/ more travel. My hope is that I can get the PUSHed internal sent to a bike shop that can do the plug and play replacement.

I used the service time to hunt for a replacement Continental trail king ll black Chili. Riders here don’t have the need for that tire. QBP is out of stock. I called Dave in Sedona @ Fat Tire to verify the correct tire. My rear tire needs to be replaced. Tomorrow I will order a pair of maxiis Ardent 2.4s to be sent to Dakota bike in Medora, ND.

I continued driving to Cuyuna Lakes area. Glad to be out of intense city traffic. Drove all the way to Crosby, MN. I tried several local shops for my tire. No such luck, one said They can order it. Not from QBP.

Nice city park right on a lake one of the 10,000 lakes of which the state is known for. I parked almost against a baseball field. I joined a group of Canadians to sit and watch the game. Some good softball baseball except for the ping of the ball hitting an aluminum bat.

Amazing drought and or high temp damage to corn crop is very localized. Separated by just a few miles one corn field was killed and the next one appeared to be healthy.