Bikes and Bands

It's Sunday and we're finally home after a three day weekend both on and off the bike.  It was a good use for my second furlough day (Friday) to pack up and go South to Faribault and the Sakatah Singing Hills Trail.  We cleverly planned to night in a bed and breakfast in town in order to spend Saturday listening to the Vintage Band Music Festival in Northfield.
Friday was the perfect summer biking day - sunny, not too humid, warm but not too hot.  We started out along Cannon Lake just outside of Faribault (to avoid nasty intersections in town) and decided to just ride until we wanted to turn around.  The Singing Hills nomenclature is so appropriate for this trail.  It's not the birds singing that is so deafening; it's the cicada.  From my office at home I can hear a cicada singing in our backyard.  Multiply that intensity by what seems thousands and you can image the "singing" by a grand chorus of cicada on the trail.

On other posts I've always focused on nature along the trails we ride but there is a striking amount of commerce going on.  Not far from Cannon Lake we ride past the Humphrey Manlift Co.  This name brings all kinds of interesting images to mind but it's a technology that moves people or things from floor to floor when you have limited space.  We also pass a very fragrant turkey farm where fans exhaust the wonderful turkey smell out to the trail.  Rumor has it the turkey dung has more value than the turkey.  I'll pass on that.  In Waterville we pedal past the Whitewater Grain and Feed elevator and the See-A-Cake company.  See-A-Cake is a leading manufacturer of bakery packing products.  Further along the trail we ride past Laska's Mercury Outboard sales and services.  That would be outboard motors for your boat which are displayed in the Laska's front yard.  Alley Scoops in Elysian sells ice cream (and hotdogs) right along the trail.  The Bear's Den is a restaurant in Elysian made from logs; we've eaten there after a ride.  Pro Fabrication, right on the trail in Madison Lake, fabricates metal.  Dale's Marine in Madison Lake sells boats but also provides snowmobile service in the off season.  And finally there's Prange's Heating and Airconditioning in Madison Lake; you can guess what they offer.  It's not all farm fields and wildflowers out there on the prairie.  Actually Faribault is a hub of manufacturing that has attracted a very diverse community. 

Back to nature which is really why we ride.Yellow is the prominent color of wildflowers on the Sakatah trail.  Our flower of choice this trip is the Woodland Sunflower or Helianthus divaricatus, member of the Aster family.  We find it usually in the woods along the trail.  At this time of year it can get fairly tall.  I braved an onslaught of mosquitoes to get this photo.  We also were looking at a goldfinch at the top of a stand of spruce in Madison lake when we looked up and saw a Northern Harrier hawk.  It's black wingtips are quite striking and the key to identification.

So you are wondering how far we ended up riding?  Our turn around point was Madison Lake (Mankato we'll see you on another trip) but it was a 50 mile endeavor.  We refreshed at the Alley Scoop with root beer floats on the way back and showed up at the Historic Hutchinson House B&B in our sweaty glory at close to the promised time of 5:30 pm.  Tami  Schluter, formerly of Eden Prairie, showed us to Dr. Hasseley's Suite where we showered, ran off to eat and headed to our first vintage band concert by the Newberry's Victorian Cornet Band at the Cathedral of Our Merciful Saviour in Faribault.  More bands and more music followed on Saturday and a second night but different room at the Hutchinson House.  In all the best of weekends, riding the bike, lots of music, two nights of hospitality at the Hutchinson House, a walk through historic Faribault and plenty of good food. 

Singing on the Sakatah Singing Hills State Trail

This is a photo at the start of our 50 mile ride at Cannon Lake just outside of Faribault, MN. The winds were gusting up to 25 miles per hour but the sun was shining, the sky was blue and the flowers were still covering the countryside. It was the type of day that made one understand why they loved the Midwest (Easterner that I am), the skies that go on forever, the vivid colors of green from the corn and soybean crops and yellow from the goldenrod, cone flowers and woodland sunflowers. It moved me to start singing "America the Beautiful" at one point (to Will's dismay). The Sakatah trail goes from town to town so many of the cyclists we meet are community cyclists and not tourists like us. They're the ones that always say Hi and comment on the bike. "That's the way to ride," one kid yelled at us while another pronounced us "Awesome!". It's a feel good trail from the forest of the State Park and Sakatah Lake to the cornfields outside of Elysian. Put that to music. I was feeling one with the bike but Will complained that he was not with it. He had put a new chain on to hopefully remedy the miserable noise in the rear wheel. I was getting excited after 40 miles because all was quiet but kept my mouth shut not wanting to mention a shutout. Unfortunately about mile 41 it started again but not quite as fingernail across the chalkboard painful. There are a number of other fixits to do which involve replacing other parts. Other screamers out there will sympathize with us. We drove the Highway 13 home and went off road to discover Kilkenny right here in Minnesota. It has a bar which was hopping on Saturday night. We now move into our fall biking schedule - hard to believe Labor Day is just around the corner.