Anamosa!

Now that the weather has become more hospitable, it’s easier to appreciate the handsome landscapes of eastern Iowa. Having made the short trek from Cedar Rapids to Anamosa and found our next resting spot, I am gazing out the camper door at blue sky, puffy white clouds, and waving soybeans…yes, at this point in their maturity, the wind makes what looks like ocean waves in the soybeans, and it’s mesmerizing to watch.

This part of Iowa is more hilly, so the terrain has an almost New England feel, except that there are no rocks. A stone wall would be a foreign concept here.

My riders stepped off so smartly this morning that they reached the mid-way meeting place in Mount Vernon before I had even left Cedar Rapids. No point in meeting them there, so on I went to the next host town. I’ve texted them to tell them how to find the RV campground and how to look for the Jolly Roger flag on a nearby camper to home in.

They have no doubt been tempted by the food venders all along the way. Annie’s favorite: Kelly’s Berry Best pies.

In this quiet spell, I will tell you a bit about the red carpet which Cedar Rapids rolled out for RAGBRAI. Their theme was “Surviving the Ride,” an homage to the reality show Survivor, particularly apt because there is an island in the middle of the river that runs through their downtown, and that’s where the main festivities were.

We shuttle-bused in for food-vender supper – garlic chicken wrap for Annie and me, and pulled pork sandwich for Arthur – and spent an hour watching the crowd, which was equal parts cyclists and local people. (My new favorite food treat – a lemon basil mint smoothie, although raspberry lime shave ice is a close second.) Because they had each cycled further in a day by 20 miles than either ever had in their lives, they were tucked in by 9:15 PM.

Czech Village: This morning the party moved on to something called “Breakfast on the Bridge.” Cedar Rapids has a large population of Czechs, and the Czech neighborhood is a bit of the old world, with shops and bakeries lining a street that leads to an arched bridge out of town.

By the time we rolled in there at 7 AM (I came along on this adventure), the street was alive with shoulder to shoulder bicyclists, an acordion band, an oompah band, cyclists doing the polka, and bakers hawking kolache, traditional Czech breakfast pastries.

We paid a visit to the National Czech and Slovak Museum, which was hosting an exhibit of works by Alfonse Mucha (Czech art nouveau illustrator from the early 1900s). Annie had been looking forward to seeing this display all week. The Museum had been nearly destroyed by a devastating flood in 2008. What was left was moved to higher ground (actually made higher for the purpose) and beautifully restored.

With the sun getting higher in the sky, it was time for Arthur and Annie to pedal east and for me to pedal back to get Big Red ready for the next to last leg of the RAGBRAI journey.

Tonight we will sample what Anamosa has prepared to tempt its throng of visitors. Each host town has created a RAGBRAI logo and theme, and Anamosa’s is a cartoon of a cyclist making great haste and the slogan, “Ride it like you stole it!”

I thought the slogan was catchy even before I learned that Anamosa is famous for being home to the Anamosa State Penitentiary, a medium and maximum security prison, which is housed in an elaborate turreted stone building known as “the White Castle of the West.” Anamosa was also named the Pumpkin Capital of Iowa by the Iowa State Legislature in 1993 and subsequently hosts Pumpkinfest, a pumpkin festival and weigh-off, each October.

Tonight we’re hoping to find a church supper. The Lutherans are having pulled pork, the Methodists are offering Big House Potatoes and Jail House Pie. Or maybe we’ll head for the Community Center for ribeye steak sandwiches and Betty’s baked beans. My riders have just texted that they have crossed the bridge into town and will soon roll in.

Tomorrow it’s on to Clinton and the end of this unusual sojourn.