Day 19 - Jamestown +30 to Fargo + 30

Hi all,
What, you ask, is this +30 stuff.  Well, it is a ploy by the cyclists to ride just far enough ahead so that the next morning, we schlep bags to the car, have breakfast then get in the car and drive 30 miles to be dropped off!  None of this - Patty sleeps in while the guys silently slink into spandex, go eat breakfast and ride away from the hotel - ha!
Today, after dropping the guys off at +30, I drove ahead to a fabulous rest stop - even had wireless - got out my camp chair, Kindle and coffee and sat in the sun reading.  Not so bad actually - bet you are all pretty jealous of my trip :)
So far, I have had pretty good luck finding the guys at the end of the day.  For those of you that know me and my directional issues, you will understand when I say that today was not one of my better days.  For some reason, I could not figure out which way to go when leaving the hotel, and only got lost twice - not even the car GPS could help.  However, never fear, I did make it to the pick up - albeit late.
Directionally challenged Patty on the Road.

Notes from Tom:  My first and only trip to North Dakota ended.  We rode into Minnesota today.

Sometime tomorrow I think we'll pass the halfway point--hard for us to believe that we've ridden that far and that we're halfway done.  Not much excitement today--proof of that is that we noticed that there weren't as many road-killed critters on the road, and there was a lot more traffic on I-94 as we got close to Fargo.  I'd like to give a big THANK YOU to our support staff, team car driver, and constant companion, Patty.  She got us through some tough days--one hot and windy one in eastern Montana, and a couple of hot ones between Glendive, MT and Bismarck. 
When we called quits this afternoon in Hawley, MN, Jerry sat by the road to flag Patty down, and I made a beer run.  Apparently the only beers you can buy as singles are 24 ounce, so I took one for the team and bought a Miller Light with the new summer graphics produced by Ball--thanks Rene.  Jerry is getting used to drinking all kinds of good beers from cans--I won't let him buy bottles.

Looking forward to dinner with Bill Makens tonight, and then on to Baxter, MN tomorrow and Duluth the next day.

Notes from Jerry:  Today was another great day on the road - great weather (it only got up to 82, but a little more humid), no tail winds but minor cross winds and smooth road.  87 miles and into Minnesota!

Yesterday as we were taking a mid morning cooler lunch, Tom looked down at my legs and said," what's with your legs"?  I looked down, noticed that my bike tan on my ankle was much more pronounced than usual and said, "what do you mean?"  Then I took a second look and said oh, my tan isn't darker - it appears to be dirt.  Patty and Tom both said, "Duh..."  I took a paper towel and took a swipe on my right leg which was much darker than the left.  Oil came off, or something like that - very black.  Tom named it the guu.  We could not figure out why mainly the right lower leg had it, as well as Tom's right lower leg.  Same thing happened today!!  Patty and I gave a thumbs down to Tom's idea that it was the locust's on the grass at the side of the road spitting on us.  I deduced today that it was oil on my chain from the Bismark bike shop replacing my chain and deraileur.  Tom's guu problem is still a bit of a mystery, because he hasn't done anything unusual with his bike.  We both cleaned our chains of any excess oil - we will see tomorrow.

The other mystery is that my bike is allergic to blinking safety lights.  Patty made a special trip to REI in Spokane to get me a nifty LED light on the back of the bike, like Tom has mounted on his bike.  It worked like a champ for the better part of a day, then somewhere after leaving East Glacier, the whole outer shell of the light (batteries, lights and cover) came off  from vibration and just vanished.  I had mounted the light at the end of the bike rack and it gets tons of vibration.  Tom saw this and put zip tye around his to avoid the same problem.  In Bismark I picked up a new one, mounted it and also put on a zip tye.  Evidently I needed to really cinch down the zip tye with a pair of pliers because my new one lasted about 3 hours into todays ride.  I first noticed that the zip tye was gone only to be followed later by the guts of the light, just like last time.  I give up I am now looking for a glow in the dark florescent triangle to put on the back of my bike rack pack - forget the light!

PS from Tom:  Our friend Bill, and a friend of his, Mike, drove hundreds of miles out of their way to have dinner with us.  It was great to see Bill, and it was fun to meet Mike.