We decided that we would carry our gear the last day, so we didn’t need to find our charter at the end of the day – we feared that if we didn’t arrive in Dubuque on-time our gear might end up on a bus to Omaha. Carrying our gear also meant that we could sleep…

The weather was threatening when we woke up, so we quickly packed up our tent and got our gear loaded onto the baggage truck. Our first stop of the day was the cafeteria for breakfast. During breakfast, the first hints of rain fell. We were glad to have our rain gear with us. Just as…

Today was the longest day of RAGBRAI according to the route maps, but for us it was only second longest. Because of our campsite locations, day 2 was longer. The day started out really well – We were riding fast and enjoying the company of many different cyclists as they passed us by (or we…

We awoke at 2 am to the crash of thunder and flash of lightning, followed immediately by a deluge of rain. We had been warned about the storm and had secured our tent with extra guy wires, so checked for leaks and tried to go back to sleep.  This was difficult, since we had been…

Although Day 3 was shorter than the previous two days, at a mere 109 km, it wasn’t as short as we had hoped and it got hot (over 40 Deg C at one point). As we approached Clear Lake, we were both very warm. Scott suggested jumping off the route and following along the lakeshore…

Today was a long day, but the route was mostly flat, making it feel similar to yesterday’s ride. At about mid-afternoon, the sky clouded over cooling things off a bit. We were concerned it might rain, but fortunately, the threatening clouds went the other way, leaving us with a beautiful day for a bike ride.…

We awoke at 5:30 am to the sound of tent zippers. A surprising number of people were already out and about, but for us this felt way too early. The midnight fireworks left us groggy and tired, but we quickly packed up and had a small bite to eat. (We brought some granola with us…

We are very glad we did not tent last night – Dubuque got another 3 inches of rain – add that to the 5 inches they got on Thursday night and the ground is soaked. It would suck to start the week with a wet tent. We arrive at the Dubuque Bowling and Beyond to…