Seg #5 Summerset Trail 9.6/26 sm

Start	Indianola, IA	N41.35532 W93.529615	N-S miles  9.6*
End	Carlisle, IA	N 41.494194 W93:48711	Trail lgth 13mi Ride26mi

 

 *Miles that count



Alex in full concentration

Most of my rides in the Midwest will be combined with meetings, family and friend visits or mini-trips to art, antique, museums, etc. Segment #5 was a grandpa assistance deal. Granddaughter Alex had a big project for school so GPa threw on his bike, drove down to Runnells and did what he could to help. As you can see,   Alex has a wonderful imagination and is becoming quite the artist. GPa was the paint mixer, holder and general nuisance. But by all accounts the day long project got rave reviews from her teacher and classmates. AND, I loved working with Alex! Even though we had some disagreements as to the way to do something, I think she will get an A+ J.

After the project was done and after I helped Chris change a blown tire on the freeway, it was time for me to hit a trail that would get me some LATITUDE. Maybe I should rename this bike trip “It’s All About Latitude”. That was an advantage for riding the  Summerset and McVay Trail. It gave me over nine miles of latitude.

 

The trails were asphalt or paving.
A smooth fast ride.

  It was hard finding the trail in Indianola, home of Simpson College. Simpson is an excellent liberal arts college. George Washington Carver first attended college at Simpson to study art and piano but he was smitten by science and agriculture. The mulitude of products and inventions Carver developed made him one of the most respected scientists to have educational roots in Iowa.  

Middle River
Bridges of Madison County
was filmed in Winterset,
Iowa 30 miles up  river.
 

The midpoint of the trail was bisected by Middle River, a dry Middle River at that. Those of you that have read “Bridges of Madison County” or saw the Clint Eastwood and Merle Streep movie will recognize this river. Unfortunately the drought in the midwest, sucked 75% of the water from its banks. Iowa is a pretty state and this ride was especially scenic with the leaves of fall showing their colors. Another treat was minimal wind, sunny skies and low humidity. It would be wounderful if all my rides were as pleasant and beautiful.

 

Heritage Trail. Seg #4 4/18

Seg #4 Heritage Trail: 4/18 sm

Start	Dubuque, IA	N42:30:38.28 W90:39:27.28	N-S miles  3.5
End	Durango, IA	N 42:33:39.88 W90:46:14.92	Total miles 18

 

Mark at an unfinished trail

segment. This bridge was

being built but we were able to

negoiate the obstacle by riding

through the dirt trail on the other

side.

Back two or three years ago, I mentioned to my friend Mark that we needed to do some bicycling together but I didn’t say I had a cross country trip in mind. I am glad I didn’t say that because it took a lot of badgering to get him to even pull down his trusty Schwinn bicycle from its moorings in the garage. In addition, there were groans about a sore elbow and the English racer handle bars on the first ten speed bike in Bettendorf, Iowa. Yes Mark’s bike was and remains cool. It’s a classic!

After marrying off his oldest son Nate, I guess Mark decided he could handle this bike riding thing. And handle it he did. He more than kept up with me and didn’t complain one word. In fact he rode extra miles that I wasn’t planning to do. Mark and Donna are dear friends that have common interests to Connie and me. Mark was a housemate of mine at the State College of Iowa, now known as the University of Northern Iowa and our best man. We both got summer jobs with the US Forest Service the summer of 1966. This was the second summer for me fighting forest fires but instead of a twelve man crew with the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, Amboy, Washington, the summer of ’66 was working on a 25 man hot shot crew out of the Deschutes National Forest in Redmond, Oregon. Mark had a fire suppression job with the Umpqua National Forest at Diamond Lake, just north of Crater Lake. To get out west we drove my beater 1955 Chevy all the way. How we made it one piece was a feat in itself. My car had a history of having been in a fire so the wiring was really screwed up; to the tune it caused the engine to shut down at inopportune times or the lights would go off while negotiating treacherous roads. One of many examples of 55 Chevy thrills was a midnight run through Death Valley. I figured if we drove late at night, we could escape the hundred plus degree desert heat. The road was a roller coaster from the git go. It twisted and turned more than an amusement park ride. When I would take a tight turn and drop in the dip of the roller coaster, the lights would pop off. It was exciting but stressful. The good thing was we rarely saw another car. Once we got out of the valley, we drove to San Francisco. We looked for a place to park and catch some zzz’s. That wasn’t a very good idea according to the officer that pulled up with his lights flashing. So we thanked the cop and continued our drive to Yosemite National Park. After taking in the scenery, we located a camp site. Mark decided to sleep on the ground with his sleeping bag. I just leaned the driver’s seat back and crashed and burned. About one in the morning I heard some clanging around. A flashlight beam exposed the culprits, five or six bears in a garbage dumpster. Mark wasn’t concerned even though they were only a twenty yards away. He agreed to sleep on the back seat and I took the front seat. That is a little bit about Mark. At another time I will talk about his Sunfish sailboat and Connie’s panicked “swim” in the Mississippi River.



We climbed over the plastic fencing
at the other end of this tunnel but this
4 ft. cattle fence was a bit of a
challenge especially with a
sprained wrist.



Our ride on the Heritage Trail went smoothly. There were quite a few bikers and their families on the trail for a Sunday afternoon. Because I am anal about not riding roads, we decided we would ride some unfinished trail segments so I would not break the rules. 

As the picture shows, we were challenged to get through barriers inserted to clear Dubuque County of liability if someone got hurt riding unfinished trail. At the end of the ride, we asked another bicyclist to take our picture. In my haste, I dumped my loose items on the trunk of the car. After the picture was taken, we left for Mark’s house. When we were unloading our bikes, my cell phone rang. It appeared my grandson was calling so I said, “Hello Ian buddy.” “How are you doing?” There was a long pause and then a lady said, “Is this Glenn Maze?” “Yes,” I said. “Well I found your wallet in the middle of highway 52!” “Holy cow,” I said. “I must have left it on my trunk when we had our picture taken”. There are honorable people in this world and I am so happy she was the one that found it.

Although this picture of Mark and me was taken before the
recovery of the lost wallet, I was smiling even more when
I got the call from a first-class Good Samaritan

Gay Lea Wilson Trail Seg #3 6/14 sm

Segment Three: Gay Lea Wilson Trail

Start	Altoona, IA	N 41:39:28.95 W 93:28:27.71	N-S miles  5.9
End	Pleasant Hill, IA	N 41:39:28.80 W 93:28:27.70	Total miles 7.2 (x2=14.4)

 

The route past Adventure Land

Wednesday’s (9/12/12) ride was a 7.2 mile jaunt that followed the Gay Lea Wilson and Four Mile Creek Rail Trails from Altoona to Pleasant Hill, Iowa. These trails were constructed in the early 1980’s from segments of abandoned railroad tracks, likely at the time owned by Chicago Northwestern Railroad. Today there remains an active rail line run by IAIS---Iowa Interstate Railroad, that parallels the trail. In the early years, the Rock Island line hired a young lawyer, to become president, Abraham Lincoln, for legal help. In addition to the railroads passing through this part of Iowa, a stage coach route line also followed a similar route. In 1840 the Iowa City, Newton, Ft. Des Moines stage coach line operated between these cities.




Marker for the 1840 Stage Coach

At that time the capital of Iowa was in Iowa City. This beautiful building remains today as a landmark for the University of Iowa. It is even more beautiful because the dome was replaced after a November 20, 2001 fire destroyed the cupola.

My first thought was terrorism

 since this was only a few
months after 911

When I heard of the fire, I went to the walk way of the Dental School to see what is shown in the photograph. Flames shooting high and wide around the recently gold covered dome. Coming on the heals of 911 and a phoney racial incident at the dental college, everyone was on theirs toes. It turned out the fire was an accident by the renovation crew and a laboratory fire and a bomb threat were the result of a failing dental student.

When the state capital was moved to Des Moines, the right of way was taken over by the Rock Island Railroad. During the 1857 move, the stage coach carrying the entire state treasury was caught in a blizzard. It took ten oxen teams days to free the coach and get the millions of dollars of state money to Des Moines. It was good the likes of Jesse James were not around to fill their pockets.  

Part of the trail I rode is named after a dedicated trail advocate, Gay Lea Wilson. Usually trails are named for historically significant individuals, events or locations, but as near as I can tell, Gay Lea Wilson is just a person like me that happens to have been a major leader in stimulating donations and getting the trail built. Good for you Gay Lea!

When ride companions, grandson Ian and son Chris were unable to participate in the ride, I decided I would ride one way and then have Chris take me back to my car at the Green Way Park Trailhead in Altoona. However I neglected to bring a cable lock from the car so when I got to the end of the trail, I had no safe way to protect my bike from being stolen. So I called Chris telling him to forget picking me up. The bummer of that decision was that the temperature dropped from 88 to 63 degrees and a northwest wind had come in a roaring. This made my ride back doubly challenging.  To add to the discomfort, it started spiting rain, making it a cold ride for this sissy boy.

The headwinds associated with this ride, caused me to think of other times when wind blasts made for a bit of a challenge. Two such instances involved annual Wadsworth VA periodontal alumni challenge trips. These trips were marketed as male bonding moments for graduates of the periodontal residency program. The idea was to design trips with enough excitement and trauma that our wives would not want to go. This would give the boys free sailing to head to the mountains, oceans and deserts to burn off frustrations of day to day periodontal practice. One such trip was a sailing trip in the British Virgin Islands. Sailing Trip! Where is the danger in that kind of event? Well we made it dangerous by doing bone head things. The biggest bone head move on the Caribbean trip was for Doctor Bruce and me to scheme an idea to steal a huge Texas flag from another boat in our group. The captain of the “Texas Flag Boat” was of course a fellow named Tex. He would fly the “gad awful” thing off the back of his boat. Most of us detested it. So after cocktail hour; more like HOURS; when it was past dusk; Bruce and I sequestered a dingy and stealthily paddled towards Tex’s boat. The more we paddled toward his boat, the farther away we seemed to be. Finally we realized there was a breeze blowing us away from our boat. We were drifting for God’s sake! Compounded by the current, we were drifting away very fast! We shouted “HELP!” When the other guys in our group realized Bruce and I were out in the currents, in the dark, the keelboat had to pull anchor to rescue us. Normally that would not sound like a big deal but not in this case. The keelboats we were sailing are designed for open water and day time sailing, not sailing at night among coral reefs and shoals. One of our guys on the ship used his spot light and hung out over the stern to guide the captain through the gaps in the reef, allowing them to get close enough for Bruce and me to finally get back on our boat. I remember the only way we could fight the wind and current, was for the captain to get down wind so we could drift back to the boat. Needless to say, we never came close to hijacking Tex’s flag and we were “toast” among the captains for the rest of the trip.

Another wind related story involves the same VA Alumni group but this time it was my turn to organize a trip in the Boundary Waters of Minnesota and Canada. One of our overnights was to be at a lodge on the Canadian side. It was roughly the third day of the trip and we were beginning to drag a bit from paddling. Thank goodness I had my son Chris with me because there would not have been any way possible for me to have rowed a canoe across open water against the wind. And, that is exactly what happened.  We all followed our guides out on this lake to cross to the Canadian side. Our sites were set on a particular bump in the horizon. No sooner had we gone a couple hundred yards from the American shores, but a big storm blew in and drove us back to the American shores we had departed from less than an hour ago. By traversing along the shore until the storm moved through, we were able to make it across the lake to the lodge---thank you Chris! Everyone was pooped and pissed, especially at me for arranging such a challenging trip. The good thing was we never got grief from our wives about wanting to join us.

Chichaqua Trail Segment #2 8/20 sm

Chichaqua Valley River Trail (TAvRT segment #2)

Start	Bondurant, IA	N 41:42:28.02 W 93:25:28.87	N-S miles 8.25
End	Baxter, IA	N 41:49:37.26 W 93:09:06.82	Total miles 20

 






 

Ready to go. Rain is gone!


OK, I finally got enough done with moving to jump on the bike and ride a few north and south miles of my  trek across America riding trails separate from the roadways. The first segment of Traversing America via Rail Trails (TAvRT) was ridden with my sons, Chris and Geoff in April (see Maiden Ride post below). For segment two, brother Don (Maze boy #6), my bull fighter brother (see the recumbent bike post) and I cranked a 20 mile ride on the Chichaqua Valley River Trail which today is called the Skunk River Valley. Native Americans called the river "Chichaqua", which meant Skunk, or "smelly place". Some believe the river was named for the odorous wild "Skunk Onions" (or Skunk Cabbage, Symplocarpus foetidus) which once grew along its banks. Being the first green plant to appear in the spring, it was sought by both Native Americans and pioneers. The good thing my smeller is defunct therefore I didn’t smell a thing. Of course with the midwest having a scorching and parched summer, just about the worse heat and drought Iowa has ever had, likely caused any odor to evaporate. The first settlers in the area of the trail came mainly from Indiana, New York and Pennsylvania. Later, Norwegians, Germans and Danes came directly from overseas and inhabited the surrounding lands. The Chichaqua bike trail evolved from the previous work of railroaders starting with the Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska Railroad in 1885. By this time nearly 4ooo folks settled in the area. Three other railroad companies owned the tracks until the Chicago Northwestern abandoned the tracks ninety-nine years later.

Don and me in front of 1800's cabose from one
 of the four railroads that ran throug Baxter

Polk County acquired the right away and developed the Chichaqua Trail after 1984. In 1987, the trail was opened to pedestrians, runners, bikers, skate boarders and so on. This is one of the few trails I have seen a sign stating “No Horses”. Usually equestrians are allowed on rail trails, if not for any other reason than to get support from these folks to help with the burdening costs of building and maintaining trails. Of course the trails could be opened motorized vehicles to bring in the dollars but how stupid would that be?! Motorized vehicles are forbidden on rail trails. I have come across a couple of snow mobiles and ATV’s while using rail trails, but none of the drivers were in shouting distance of my curse. 

Even though Iowa has been blistering hot this summer, with a drought to boot, we got rain the morning of this Chichaqua ride.  It rained all the way to the trailhead one mile northeast of Bondurant, Iowa. Lucky for us the storm moved, away from us, so no rain fell on our petite little bodies. However, the rain that had fallen eariler soaked some parts of the trail. The sign at the trailhead said, “Opening in the fall of 2012". We took that to mean if we were crazy enough to ride through repair areas, it was our doing and we would not be thrown in jail. Well we were punished anyway, because the first 3-4 miles of the trail was strewn with a ubiquitous sum of walnuts, branches and leaves. Then we came upon a trail mending project. A bridge was flooded out a year ago. There wasn’t any water in the creek bed, probably because it dried up due the drought. It looked a bit challenging for a couple of senior citizens, but big brother Don said, “We can do this”. And, we did; down the bank with our bikes, without falling on our butts. But we needed to get up the other side. That was the rough part.  The soil in this part of Iowa came from the Wisconsin Glacier during the last Ice Age.  A richly black soil called gumbo was waiting for us. What a challenge! When you took one step forward, you would slide back two. I have never seen or stepped in such a sticky mucky soil, even the muddy poopy cow lots of my youth were not as bad as this gunk. My guess is  this stuff could be used as an adhesive. Our bike wheels and shoes were mired in the heaviest crap. When we could no longer wheel the bikes, we had to carry them. The tries, brakes, spokes and any other part of the bike that touched this greasy black clay loaded the bikes down an extra ten to fifteen pounds. Eventually we made it through the black gluey muck. We used tree branches to scrape off enough soil to head down the trail. It felt like I added ten pounds to the bike yet the derailers and brakes worked fine.



Gumbo Glue. The trail tested us where a

bridge had washed out. We had to

negoiate nearly a city block of greasy

goop. What a workout!



When we got to Baxter, Iowa, the end point of the Chichaqua trail, we found a car wash and uncovered the original bicycles from their black gumbo stucco.  Even with high pressure, the goo fought removal.  Our wives, Mary and Connie, were good sports and came to Baxter and hauled us to the southern trailhead near Bondurant to pick-up my car. Don did the math on the GPS readings and figured Segment #2 gave me 8.25 north south miles. There is a long long way to go! Only 26 miles of the more than 1500 mile distance between north and south American borders are under my belt. Plenty to go yet!!!

The Maze Boys (#6 & #8) after the car wash.