I've been away from computers for the past 11 days and so much has happened. On July 12th we had our first century with 112 miles into Chicago. It was a great ride with 2 amazing non-PB&J lunches that made it easy. Riding into the skyline on a crowded Sunday bike path was an awesome experience. We were even met by two NUS '08 riders with cupcakes waiting for us along the way. Wade and I had a great conversation and Chicago deep dish dinner that night Dan--a leader from last year's trip. An easy day the next day, we spent the morning seeing the bean and millennium park, wrigley field, and a swim and nap on the beach of Lake Michigan.

We rode to Greyslake, IL for a night and then headed to Janesville, WI. On the ride into Wisconsin we stopped at a cheese store where I enjoyed my first cheese curds, along with samples of all different types of cheeses. Delicious. Janesville was alot of fun because one of the girls on our trip--Alli--is from there and her parents and neighbor were nice enough to take us on the boat for water skiing and tubing. I got up on the skis and had a great time. We worked the next day in Janesville for Community Action on a forclosed house. The house needed some demolition work before it could be restored--turned out to be another fun day.

From there we headed another short day to Madison, WI. Madison was a fun biker friendly city. We had a fun evening in town and ate at a great Thai restaurante. We stayed for a successful day working for Habitat for Humanity. I helped a nice woman named Gwen install Subfacia (I don't know if that's spelled right, just learned what it was--part of the house framing just below the roof) for the morning and installed roofing boards in the afternoon.

More Wisconsin. The next day into Gays Mills was my hardest ride day of the trip and maybe hardest workout of my life. The route was scheduled for 101 miles of hilly terrain. Starting earyly with the 5am wake up, I got two flat tires before lunch around mile 35. At mile 50, Wade, Eileen, and I joined/followed Jason on what we called an architecure adventure. We headed for the Taliesin--Frank Lloyd Wright's main house and studio. Turned out the tours were full for the next two hours, and it would have cost us fifty bucks to get in anyway--so we looked from afar. We headed back to the route with an extra 25 miles of very hilly terrain under our belts, no big deal. Ready to get going again, a man flags us down at a gas station and we help him pump up his tire--road bike tires have different nozzels than car tires so the gas station pump wouldn't work. Turns out we were helping the Culver family--owners of Culver's restaurante, a big ice cream/fast food chain in the midwest. We followed him around the block and he gave us each 2 coupons for free ice cream sundays and one for a food basket. Good deal. We pushed the next 40 tough miles to second lunch waiting for us. It was about 4 and Nate--sweep that day--was waiting on us. We were told the van may have to come pick us up because we might not be able to make it before dinner and everyone else was already there or very close--disheartening. We pushed on with Nate, up and down what seemed like Wisconsin Mountains. With about 15 miles to go, the van pulls up. We're all ready to convince Rachel that we can make it and we don't have to ride the van, but it turns out only a few people were at the host, so we went for it. Harder than any football game, pushed the last 15 miles into Gays Mills. 125 miles! Quite an accomplishment. I ate like I never ate before--amazing pot luck with vegetarian chili and cheese potatoes I was just pouring down my throat. The rest of the night was a blur, but I woke up the next day ready to go.

It's crazy when 72 miles is a recovery day. Mississippi River! Road along the river most of the day. We crossed into Iowa, rode into Minnesota, then back to La Crosse, Wisconsin for the night. The next day we continued along the river to Peppin lake, and today we rode again rode the Mississippi to St. Paul and the twin cities. Excited for the first day off tomorrow! More later.