Day 54: A Minnesota Bike Path

I was on the Paul Bunyon State Trail bike path almost the entire day except for the few miles from and to houses at the beginning and end. Minnesota is known for its bike paths - it has an impressive number of them and some really quite long, so you can do big trips almost entirely on path.

North from Nisswa

After coffee, breakfast, and saying goodbye to Melissa and Steve, Mike, Enette and Ian rode off with me this morning for a few towns north, which was a lot of fun! I haven’t ridden with people much in the last month.

The miles came pretty easy today between being on bike path, having a bit of a tail wind, and riding on well rested legs. I got up to Pine River and took a smoothie and coffee cake break there at a coffee shop that turned out to be more of a church that happened to have a coffee shop inside.

From Pine River, I headed north to Backus where there was a nice picnic pavilion right on the trail. I stopped for lunch there. On my way out of town, I ran into a couple of touring cyclists headed the other way. They were headed from Washington to Connecticut (back home) via a slightly wandering route and figured they’d put in about 5,000 miles this tour.

In Walker, I stopped at a bustling city park. There was a perfect bench under a couple of trees and right on the shore that had my name on it. I had a leisurely snack and got in touch with Marriot customer service to see what the deal with Fargo is this weekend as there was availability, but the app wouldn’t let me book it. They were able to help me out and I now can get to Fargo on Saturday!

Bemidji was my destination for today. It started to rain as I got to town, but I didn’t bother with rain gear given how close I was to stopping. I ate dinner at a tavern right on the bike path on the lake, where I was able to sit outside under an awning. Another Mary is hosting me for the night! She lives close to the trail. We had a nice time chatting and drinking tea and staring at maps. She’s had quite a few cyclists stay with her this season - more than usual, which is interesting as the bicyclist bunkhouse hadn’t seen nearly as many as usual.