Does everyone recognize the names of the towns listed in the above route? I think I listed them all, except for Logan, between Sawyer and Minot. In other words, there's a lot of open space in those 74 miles between the state park and Burlington. Much of the first half of the route is in prairie pothole country, land leveled during the last glacial period. The drainage is not quite mature, even though erosion has sculpted hills out of the level (and if you don't believe there are hills, your bike is the best way to disprove me :-). Water sits in pools at the foot of the hills, sometimes over a small area, and other times covering several acres. These "pot holes" are home to many species of critters, of which we saw quite a few. The first thirty miles or so started with a side and head wind, letting us enjoy the scenery just a little longer. With a rosy attitude like that, I knew it had to be the first day, because headwinds brought on different, non-printable thoughts toward the end of the week. I also knew that once we turned north at Benedict, we had 45 miles of tail wind. :-)

Max was the first rest stop, sponsored by the Max Civic Club. They'd run out of water, so rather than having to wait while more was fetched, I was glad to have brought three water bottles along so I could keep moving. The tailwind did materialize at Benedict (population around 50), and that helped us climb to the continental divide. Yep, it's there, separating the south-flowing waters with the north-flowing waters.

That reminds me of a story I heard earlier this summer: Two fellows from London had a grand plan of canoing from Lake Winnepeg in Manitoba to the Gulf of Mexico over a summer (last summer or maybe even this year's). What they failed to realize, however, was that their first leg, the Red River, flows *into* Lake Winnepeg from the south, and not south out of Lake Winnepeg. They were six weeks behind by the time they made it to Fargo.

Once I got to the top of the ridge (without really realizing it until I got there), there was a hill which looked to be a half mile long. It kept going down and down and down. At the next rest stop, one fellow said that he didn't pedal for 3.3 miles and never dropped below 20mph. We were glad we weren't going the other direction, into the wind!

After climbing back out of the valley, everyone was cruising because of the wind, until we dropped into the Souris River Valley at Sawyer. From there we headed northwest up US52 into Minot. The bluffs were hampering the tail wind, the temperature was rising, and traffic was heavy, making this the least favorite section. To make matters a little worse, we were expecting the lunch rest stop to be *in* Minot at the church sponsoring it. In reality, one of the "it looks like someone trying to capitalize on CANDISC" stops on US52 was actually the church's. Sometimes homemade signs just aren't convincing enough.

Anyway, by the time I got to Minot, Burlington was a few miles down the road and my belly wasn't rumbling (it got stuffed at each stop), so I kept going. On the other side of Minot, I had a shock looking in my rear view mirror, and seeing a freight train hot on my tail! Right at that point the tracks had met up with the highway, and I was seeing the train coming around the curve almost right at me. It was a long one, traveling 1-2mph faster than I was, so I got to ride alongside all the way to Burlington. For a mostly-armchair railfan, that was quite a treat! :-)

Burlington (pop. 1000) hosted us that night at their Sports Complex. Since I'd missed lunch in Minot (many stopped at various restaurants), I was toward the front of the pack. That has its advantages of prime tent spots, no wait for the warm showers, etc. Life was good. They were running a van shuttle to the school for showers. After camp was set up and I had made the trip to the showers, I stopped in at the local grocery store and chatted with the owner for 10-15 minutes. I needed to call Janet in Minot, so I asked where the nearest pay phone was. The owner replied that there wasn't one available, and to just use the phone over on the wall. I'm turning into too much of a city slicker.

(And so is Brian. On Saturday when we were on US52 west of Carrington, he asked, "Daddy, is this a highway?" "Well yes, why wouldn't it be?" "Where are all the cars?!")

The next couple of hours was spent reading, walking around camp, watching the riders come in, visiting, etc. The riding is certainly fun and a big part of the week, but I really like the "hanging out" aspect of CANDISC.

The rest of the day: Mom, Dad, Linda, Brian, Melissa, and I were invited to Janet and Todd's for supper. I'd have preferred that Dad and Todd (and Peter) were back in Burlington with me, but at least there was no waiting in line for food. :-) Bedtime was about 9:30, when the sun went down.