Hello from Fitchburg, Wisconsin! Since my last post we have crossed into our 10th state and are currently just south of Madison. The team departed Highland Park yesterday morning and headed to Evanston Northwestern Healthcare for a tour, breakfast and a sit down panel with some doctors, nurses and cancer survivors. It was extremely informative and well worth the delay in the riding schedule! At about 11am we departed the hospital to begin our 60+ mile ride to Lake Geneva, WI. The first part of the day consisted of riding on bike paths before we took to the open back roads for the second half of the ride. Around 2pm well pulled over to the side of the road and enjoyed bagels for lunch. I need to note that I opened up my rhubarb pie for eating and a few of us made rhubarb pie bagel sandwiches! After lunch as we were approaching the Wisconsin State line we got lost but thankfully out of nowhere a 10-year old named Matthew appeared on a bicycle and after getting his mother's approval and his helmet rode us about 1/2 a mile down the road and pointed us in the right direction. Matthew if your reading this - YOU SAVED THE DAY! When we arrived at Brad's lake house the majority of us went for a quick swim in Lake Geneva before another amazing dinner prepared by Brad's mother and father and Andrea's mom. This was followed by Smore's!
Today began bright and early with a pancake/french toast breakfast prepared by Brad's parents. After a few photos we were on our way ready for a short 60+ mile day that turned into a 77 mile day!! I'm not sure if it was the weather or maybe I'm just allergic to the state of Wisconsin because I was extremely tired all day. We stopped somewhere around mile 50 for lunch on the side of the road where I had peanut butter and jelly with Moxley cookies in the middle. (While my mom won't send pie in the mail she has sent the team cookies!) After lunch the hills seemed to become more and more frequent and I was extremely happy to see the church by the time we reached mile 77. My bag seems to have grown a bit in the past few days after receiving a box that my parents sent me and while I'm waiting to find a post office to send it home it's become an art to fit it all in. One of the extra things in my bag was handlebar tape so after arriving today I gave my bike a facelift and I now have boring black tape on the handlebars as I have removed the dirty light blue tape that kept insisting that it fall off. I then took a short nap only to wake up to a cameo appearance by the one and only Drew Webster (I4K '07)! Drew and noodles & company treated the entire team to dinner which was amazing - a BIG thank you to both Drew and noodle & company! Drew also told me that he has peanut butter ice cream in the freezer for us here at the church - Drew you Rock!!! I have to mention that Praveen is letting me use his laptop to update this and some photos so Praveen you rock too!
I have too many photos to upload them all to my album right now (hopefully I'll find a library on our next rest day to catch up on that) so here are a few from the past few days. There are a few new pictures in the album but there are many more to come!
Ride-a-long with 2007 I4K alum. (Nick, Anish, Jon, Sean, Sandy, Keith)
2008 Team at the Bean in Chicago
Me and my Ice Cream Art in Highland Park