Headwinds & Hills: Des Moines to Atlantic

On Friday, Team Portland had what most of us agree was our hardest day of the entire trip! Amazingly enough, we actually thought it topped Day 2, when we rode 75 miles on stiff legs, scaling 2 giant mountains and tons of Pennsylvania's rolling hills.

We left the Marriott in the morning feeling well rested but super bummed we had to leave the awesome hotel. We were to bike 82 miles to Atlantic, Iowa. Coming out of Des Moines, we were on some sweet, flat trails with lots of curves that were really fun. They were shaded, and trees on both sides left us blissfully unaware of what we were in for the rest of the day.

About 20 miles in, we were off the trails and were on roads for the rest of the day. That's when we were introduced to a little thing we call 20-30 mph headwinds. The winds were half headwinds and half sidewinds. So basically, we were riding into the wind and being pushed into the road at the same time. A great combination! 

It LOOKS like a pretty day.. but looks can be deceiving!! You can't see the brutal winds.

Riding with the winds was extremely tiring and cumbersome. Not to mention that Iowa was getting extremely hilly: we had constant rolling hills. The wind was so bad that we still had to pedal going downhill or we'd slow to almost a stop. This means we never gained any momentum to help us up the next hill, so it basically felt like we were going uphill the whole day. 

Also, the whipping winds made it nearly impossible to hear anything around us, and I was scared the wind would knock me off my bike! It certainly felt unsteady, and gusts of wind would blow me around quite a bit. I was worried about going into traffic, but I was able to keep pretty good control of my bike.

Our extremely slow progress caused us to take frequent breaks and set up the water and food stops closer together than usual. We were expending sooo much effort and covering very little ground! We were burning more calories than we're used to, and the food van was such a welcome sight when we pulled up to it that I had to give the drivers hugs.

We stopped in the tiny town of Casey to play on this old playground.

....Another playground stop, this time in the town of Adair.
We dared Chris (6'4", nicknamed Thor) to go down this slide.

...Yes I promise we do sometimes bike and not play on playgrounds all day.

We passed through several REALLY small Iowa towns along the way. I mean so small that the entire town did not have a single stoplight. One or two stop signs and that's it. However, the small towns were a welcome sight for us because it meant some buildings to break the wind for us for a half mile or so. The towns had some interesting slogans on their signs.

Anita: A Whale of a Town.... pretty sure there aren't any whales within 1000 miles.

STUART: Home of 1700 good eggs... and a few stinkers, apparently.

To say the day was tiring was an understatement. Every mile just dragged. My group usually got way ahead of me on the hills. Luckily, Nitkin hung back with me to keep me company on the hills. I was happy to not be left alone to tackle them myself. 

With 20 miles left, Nitkin also decided to motivate my group in an unusual way: "Just pretend these 20 miles are communism... and you are Uncle Sam. BAM!! Cold War!!!" The reference was so out of the blue that we were cracking up hysterically getting back on our bikes.

Jen, Nitkin and Chris in the final few miles of the ride.

Finally making our way into Atlantic.

A bank called Rolling Hills in Atlantic. You can say that again!!

We finally rolled into our host about 6:30 pm, after 10.5 hours on the road, but not before climbing a huge hill right before getting to the host. It seems that every host is located at the top of a hill!! 

Our host was a YMCA, which was a first-time host but they were amazing. They had a great dinner waiting for us and cooked us breakfast in the morning also. Also, we always like YMCA showers because there are plenty of them and they're sure to be hot!

Everyone gathered around dinner to rehash the memories of the day and discuss our hatred of Iowa. It had not been treating us very nicely, what with the terrible storms earlier in the week, the huge rolling hills, and the ridiculous winds. The consensus was that Iowa was nearly as bad as Pennsylvania, and we couldn't wait to get to Nebraska!

With that, we hit the hay and prepared to leave Iowa once and for all the next day.

Stay tuned for a post on our first two days in Nebraska!