We turn east this morning, at the beginning of a more or less beeline shot across the state to the shoreline of Lake Michigan. Conditions along the lake once we get there look like they’ll be significantly cooler and more pleasant, but in the meantime we have another 5 hot and humid days ahead of us. Today’s 57 miler to Abbotsford will be the longest day of the tour so far, so we’ll get an early start. If it gets to feeling too hot for comfort, we’ll take heart from knowing that an excellent meal at Fat Boy’s Bar & Grill is waiting for us at the end of the day.
Viewing the hydroelectric Chippewa Falls River Dam from probably it’s less interesting side. At the time it was built in 1915, it was regarded as the largest earthen dam in the world, measuring 67 feet high and 4,390 feet long.
We’re working our way through the alphabet today. Many of the county roads in this part of Wisconsin have such imaginative names as J, N, and X. You can just imagine how exciting board meetings must get when it comes time to name a new county road, with everyone lobbying for their favorite letter. “What about K, is that taken yet? Oh, shoot. Well, Q then. I’ve always had a fondness for Q. What about you, Phil? Don’t you think Q would be perfect? Wouldn’t your niece Quincy be just thrilled?”
We make our way through a good share of the alphabet today, leaving town on J before quickly moving on to X. M, N, and MM came later, and we also cross paths with D, E, G, K, O, P, T, and XX. So you can see we had quite a full and exciting day of it.
As a general rule, all of the alphabet roads made for excellent cycling, and we haven’t yet seen the letter we didn’t like. Two deserve special mention though. MM was our favorite of the lot - very low traffic, scenic. It helped too that we rode MM early in the day before it heated up too much.
And then there’s X. X was the old Highway 29, and the primary route between Chippewa Falls and Abbotsford before the modern, four lane Highway 29 was built maybe 30 years ago. Earlier in the last century it formed a part of the historic Yellowstone Trail, the first coast to coast automobile route through the northern states. We’re riding on history today.
The first 48 miles of today’s ride were as good as one could hope for, given that we’re riding on a hot, highly humid day. We’re gently rolling all day long, cutting across shallow river valleys - in one ten mile stretch, we drop to and climb away from the Wolf, the North Eau Claire, the South Eau Claire, and the Black. We’re either rising or falling, but never steeply and none of the rises amounts to much. We’re passing through Mennonite country, and there’s a lot to see - barns with character, horse drawn buggies, colorful laundry hung out to dry. It’s much more interesting than yesterday’s tunnel of green on the Chippewa River State Trail.
An impressive display of vintage gas station art at Affordable Auto Parts, on County Road N.
I’d never heard of Oregon Chief Gasoline before, but apparently it’s a highly prized sign among garage art collectors. The brand originated from the Inland Refinery in Spokane, which had plans for gas stations in Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana until it was quickly bought out by Wasatch Oil. Most of the signs were never put to use and went into storage until they started showing up decades later in antique shops.
Scott AndersonTo Jen RahnI wondered also and considered running down the field after him to ask but I was worried about ticks. Reply to this comment 3 years ago
The man on the right was just biking out from his field as I passed, so we stopped to exchange pleasantries. Then his daughter walked down the driveway to say hello. Then one boy, then another.
We saw four different buggies along this stretch of X Road. I thought they must be Amish, but they’re more likely Mennonite. There’s a large Mennonite population in this part of the state, with a dozen of their churches strung along the road from here to Abbotsford.
It’s a long ride though, and by the end the heat and humidity start wearing on us. It’s disappointing when we come to the end of X and find that the continuation road we planned to ride is an unpaved, dusty washboard. Eleven miles of that in this heat is more than we care to take on, so we have no difficulty deciding to drop down to the modern Highway 29 and following it the rest of the way in to Abbotsford. It’s got a good shoulder and is a safe but noisy ride, but there’s not a spec of shade so we feel well baked when we finally turn off and roll up to our motel.
This was a great 48 mile ride, which was unfortunately 59 miles long. At the end we’re on the new highway 29, which overlaid the historical Highway 29 (aka County Road X) for the last 11 miles before Abbotsford. Busy, but with a shoulder sufficient for a Mennonite buggy it’s good enough for us too.
Video sound track: Swift Breeze, by Yasmin Williams
It’s only 1 when we arrive at the Home Motel, so it’s a relief when the manager lets us check in to our room right away. Rachael immediately leaves for the store a block away for some ice cream and returns with a quart of milk that quickly disappears. After that we shower and stay close to the AC until it’s time to go check out what the Fat Boy has to offer.
Fat Boy’s Bar & Grill didn’t let us down. A simple place, but very friendly and the food was good.
Bill ShaneyfeltSeveral years back, some young guys annually went to Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness for a week of canoe/fish/camping and convinced me to go along for 6 of them. A 17 hour drive from Dayton, OH swapping out drivers a few times. We always stopped at Fat Boy's for pizza on the way home.
