It was a dark and stormy night when we began to talk about riding some of the Iowa 150, which was the Iowa Sesquicentennial Celebration bicycle tour from Long Beach CA, leaving on Memorial Day, and arriving in Washington DC on Labor Day. The plan was to ride from Reno NV to Nashville TN. Jan Lautner and Jeanne Repetto would ride the entire ride, and I would sag for them and ride as much of the ride as I could.
We joined the ride in Nevada and as I rode out that first morning I was enjoying being our of the van for the first time after driving three days.
My plan was to ride all of the passes and most scenic parts of the ride. The only problem was that I felt like a salmon swimming upstream to breed. I would ride out of town with the early group in the morning, and at some point turn around and ride back into town and pick up the van. Then I would drive the van to the other end and ride out to meet the riders.
For quite a few days many of the riders thought they were having this recurring nightmare where they kept meeting this biker who was always riding the wrong way. Many people believed I was riding every part of the ride twice.
The best part of this system was that I got to ride some really nice parts of the country, could warn riders of problems ahead, and could use the van as a sag when it was needed.
Happy Trails.