By David Zytkoskee
Randy, Justin, Tony, Pat, Mason, Jenny, Kyle, John, and I left for a nice, easy bike trip in southern Minnesota. Ya right whatever! Mission 1: get to the campsite.
We drove down to Nerstrand State Park and on our way down we realized the eclipse was happening so we all looked up (ouch!) that’s when it hit me (whack! Ouch, that smarts!) If I use 2 pair of sunglasses I could see it, so I did it and 5 minutes later I had a headache and my eyes hurt. Boy aren’t we bright! So we set up camp and biked into Northfield and looked at St. Olaf and Carleton colleges. When we got back everyone was complaining about how tired they were, as I sat on my log thinking: “Boy, are they in for it tomorrow.”
Mission 2: Bike to Fountain. We arrived in Chatfield around 8:00 or 9:00 for some grub. After stuffing ourselves, we walked to the van a block away to unload. After unloading, we headed for Fountain which was about 13 miles. For the first hour the biking was easy, mostly downhill and flat, with the wind at our back. Then came THE WINDS. Sure we had two big downhill runs, but the wind was coming from the front and seemed to blow its hardest when I was going downhill. This would almost stop me if I didn’t continue pedaling. This was the same with the flat road, but when I was going uphill there seemed to be no wind at all.
After a lot of huffing and puffing we all crawled into Fountain, where we found an ice cream parlor, which we ate at. After an hour of eating, we took off on the trail to Lanceford. About five or ten minutes after takeoff, I passed everyone except Mason and Justin. I could see them for a while until three girls passed byyyyyy…Wow! But.. anyway, we arrived in Lanesboro and had a debate on where to eat. Three of us said one café, three said another, and Justin wanted to go to the bakery. After a while we were grouping up and it was discovered by John that Mason was missing. So, we left to go back to Fountain. Justin and I sat in the same ice cream parlor for about an hour before everyone showed up. When we got back to town, I fell over, tired as h*l#. I was lying in the grass and some strange girl came hopping along. She annoyed all of us.
Mission 3: Last big ride…
We headed out to Cannon Falls and biked into Welch where Tony was waiting for Justin and me. When everyone caught up, we headed for Red Wing, our lunch spot. After eating, we went back and of course, I was the first to get there. When everyone biked up to Welch a couple of us left. After about half an hour John caught up to me and he was tired. We arrived in Cannon Falls about 45 minutes before the rest of the group. While dinner was being prepared, Mason, Kyle, Tony, Justin, and I decided to play 500 in the dark… not a fun thing to do!
The last day we biked for about two hours and headed back to the van and home.
The list of morons… I mean the brave knights in shining armor were:
Mason Davey
Justin Secor
Tony Bernatz
Jenny Bedford
Pat Cretan
Kyle Bryntesen
David Zytkoskee
John Dramstad
and of course, Randy “the bullet” Nelson