Triumphrat

propforward · 08-16-2009, 10:05 PM

Okelly Dokelly, as Ned Flanders would have it.

This last saturday, I hooked up with Squier 51 and Kframe for another ride.

I like to have a destination, to help force me to look for new roads, and this time I chose "The Mindoro Cut". You'll find out just what the Mindoro cut is in a minute.

So, I started out by heading south from my country estate - the day dawned in a sticky sort of way, cool enough, but humid enough to bear the promise of rain and thunder later on

Dawn:

As long as the sun keeps doing that, things must be OK.

So, off bright and early, rendezvous with Squier and Kframe at the Perkins in Northfield. We really need to find a small town cafe, luckily I think I have just the one, but that is for next time.

After a suitable feast, we were away - Mn 19 across to Cannon Falls, and then cruise on to Red Wing. From there on Mn 58 south to Zumbrota. First part of the trip was OK - cruisy stuff, with a few sweeping bends and some bluffs. Very nice.

At Zumbrota we joined Mn 60, and headed west, through various towns such as Zumbro Falls (I wonder what the establishemnt *****cat Cabaret might be about?) and Dumfries - heavy Scottish influence in this area. I have reported on this road before - it is a lot of fun. We paused just before Wabasha, as Kframe had a prior engagement so he had to peel off at that point.

Action photography as other riders sweep by:

Squier and I continued on, and went through Wabasha and crossed the Mississipi (Wabasha famous for.......anybody? anybody? That's right, the Movie "Grumpy Old Men", 2 points).

We contunued with our cruisy theme, by travelling south on the Wisconsin side of the river on Wi-35 - a very scenic road. Easy to ride, but lots of bluffs and river views, and plenty of stops along the way. At any point you can jump off on a county road for good twisty fun, but we had to avoid our usual ones this time in order to get to our destination and back.

propforward · 08-16-2009, 10:10 PM

So down Wi-35 we went, and then joined US 53 - pausing briefly atop a hill on that route, at Decorah Peak:

Shortly thereafter we took county road T west, which was a lot more curvy and fun, and this eventually joined up with state road 108 at Mindoro. SR 108 is great, well paved, and twisty turny in the best way - but watch out for gravel in the bends. We paused for a fuel stop, meeting a couple of other riders in the process, one on a Sprintg and one on Z1000 - great pair of guys, and they gave us dire warnings of storms to the North.

Well, we were undeterred as

a) we were heading south
b) there was not a damn thing we could do about it anyway.

So we twisted and turned and dived and weaved our way to....

The Mindoro Cut! Here it is:

propforward · 08-16-2009, 10:19 PM

We had been there a few minutes, when all of a sudden a group of other motorcyclists showed up - all dual sport types. Turns out they are a group of folks I converse with on the adventure rider forum - what a fun coincidence. I had never met any of them before, but I recognized their bikes (and they recognized mine) from various postings:

They were off to do a bit more gravelly stuff, so we did not join up with them, but everyone wished everyone well, and after I negotiated a headstart so that I wouldn't have to suffer being overtaken or anything, squier and I were off southwards again, to enjoy the remainder of SR 108, down to CR 16, and on to La Crosse.

We crossed over the river again, and continued west on Mn 16. The weather reports all said the storms were going to the north, so we decided to head west now, and go north later on.

I'm glad we did, Mn 16 is another great sweeping cruising road.

We paused for another leg stretch at a waysode rest next to the river (but which river???? Must look that up. EDIT: Looked it up, it is the Root River). In looking down at the river I spied a lovely bikini clad lady drifting down river in a tube - a popular hot day passtime. I wooed her by telling her the time. Score 1 for propforward, ever the Casanunda. Shortly after that a guy in a Trans Am pulled in. "Out Cruising?" Yup. He then proceeded to tell me about his car. Not a word about our lovely Bonnies, he pulled in to show off his freakin duller than life Trans Am with its original paintwork.

Well, I was suitably polite and impressed and then we went our separate ways.

And so we cruised away again, on to Preston, and another scenic pause:

propforward · 08-16-2009, 10:26 PM

From here we wound our way northwards - keeping an eye on the threataning sky. We followed US 52 to Rochester, and then tookj US 63, to join up with Mn 60 at Zumbro Falls again. This time west on Mn 60, and the sky kept getting darker!

Fuelling up in Zumbrota, I was convinced we were going to get rained on, but nothing to do except keep going. We took County Road 6 for a little change, and paused when it joined Mn 19, just west of Red Wing.

I don't know what they blast down that road, but they weren't doing it that day.

This was pretty much the end of the group ride - Squier turned north for the cities through Welch and Hastings, I went west on Mn 19, through Northfield, and on through New Prague and Belle Plaine. The skies got heavier and heavier.....until.......I turned north......and then it turned out I had perfectly circled the stormn, and went north behind it. There had clearly been a deluge, but I rode through afterwards! Sweet! No need to stop and don rain gear.

A great end to a great day...I finished the ride at 9.00pm, dark enough to test my new headlamp (excelllent) and 530 miles later. Set out at 6.30 am, back at 9.00pm. Not bad - a great ride, great company, great roads.

All in all, a grand day out.

HiDesert · 08-20-2009, 12:28 AM

Nice report, prop! I was really enjoying the historical signs, but you didn't let us finish one of them! If it says, "Continued on other side," don't leave us hanging! Go back and get us a picture of the other side!