We did it!

Bike route 65593 - powered by Bikemap 

We biked from Minneapolis to Stevens Point, Wisconsin! It took us three days, with 67.3 miles the first day, 84 miles the second day, and 105 miles the third day. The map above shows how we got from Minneapolis to the Wisconsin border, mostly on bikeways. It's a lovely, scenic route along the Midtown Greenway in Minneapolis, across St. Paul on Summit Avenue's bike lane, then out of St. Paul toward Stillwater and the St. Croix River on the Gateway State Trail. The weather was warm and sunny until a thunderstorm overtook us in Wisconsin, and then it remained pleasantly warm during the days and cool at night. We had some problems with unexpected detours along the way. Our prepared maps didn't help much, since we had to re-route completely.

It's wonderful how much more you see of wildlife from a bike. A red fox spotted us from the side of the road and dissolved back into the tall grass. A bald eagle flew along just over us for a mile or so. We saw deer, wild turkeys, and sandhill cranes along the way.

I'll write more about the trip in the next post.