Madison, Wisconsin, quietly nestled between Lakes Mendota and Monona, was a charming city for a rest weekend! There are bike paths, lovely parks, and plenty of things to do. I was able to catch up with a whole slew of RPI connections while in town, including my friends Mike and Jill and the indefatigable Kulp clan. It was a restful weekend spent checking out such novelties as the Mustard Museum, the Saturday Farmers Market, the Capitol building and the Memorial Union Terrace. The Capitol has an accessible rotunda around the dome that gives you a 360 degree view of the city and a peek at both lakes. The terrace, which is a part of UW Madison’s campus, is right on Lake Mendota and is brimming with people on nice days. Overall, a wonderful city.
After this fun filled, touristy time in Madison, we headed to our 7th state - Illinois! On this 80 mile day, I broke two more spokes on my back wheel. This offset the true of the wheel just enough that I had to release the rear brake and only ride with the front brake until we were able to find an open bike shop. After getting everything fixed up, we continued on to Rockford, where we stayed with our college friend Sam Ferrec. At the start of the trip, an 80 mile day would have killed us. However, our newly adjusted bodies weren’t even tired that day! Soon after arriving, we went to a pick up frisbee game with Sam and got our second workout of the day. It was great to be able to play again!
After a lovely homemade dinner we crashed in the living room. We ended up taking another rest day in Rockford. During the day I biked to the Klehm Arboretum and Botanic Garden. In the evening, we joined Sam and his roommates to watch a concert in the Anderson Japanese Gardens. The gardens are the number one tourist attraction in Rockford, and they were beautiful to explore. We were also lucky to have a gorgeous sunset! After the concert, we hung out for a while back at Sam’s place and had some valuable bonding time with the dog, Shadow.
The next morning we packed up our stuff and headed to a campground outside of Elgin, Illinois. We set up our site, then went to grab food in town where we met up with Alexx! Back at the campground, we made a fire, relaxed and enjoyed another gorgeous sunset. After a small corned beef hash setback in the morning, we were on our way to Chicago! We enjoyed a long network of bike paths, and stopped briefly in a park for lunch, acroyoga and disc tossing. That evening we rolled up to my friend Rachel’s place in Logan Square. Rachel and I met last summer because we were both leaders for Teen Treks bike trips. She and her boyfriend, Brad, have lots of experience with bike touring and they were fantastic hosts. They set us up with everything we needed, took us out to dinner, and told us all about their love for Chicago (which quickly rubbed off on me). When we got home from dinner we met the rest of the roommates and hung out for a bit before dozing off in the living room. The next morning we woke up refreshed, ready to explore Chicago, and excited to meet up with our good friend Varun. He had flown in all the way from Baltimore to visit us and his Chicago dwelling sister and brother in law. Let the adventures begin!
