Country Views: A Ride With Steve

Steve Fuller (R) and N.Y. Roll on a ride Saturday

Saturday was scheduled to be a ride with N.Y. Roll and an old friend I haven't seen for over a year, former Trans Iowa finisher, volunteer, Tour Divide finisher, and now part of the Iowa Wind and Rock/ Iowa Gravel Classic/ Spotted Horse crew, Steve Fuller.

Steve was coming through the area on a trip to pick up a new-to-him Salsa Cycles Warbird. He figured a nice test ride with friends was in the cards so he set up a thread on Facebook Messenger with myself and N.Y. Roll to work out the details. Since Steve wouldn't be back through the area until afternoon, a 1:00pm meet-up time was set, and N.Y. Roll swung by the G-Ted headquarters to collect me at 12:40pm. Off we went to the North side of Waterloo.

The route plan was left up to N.Y. Roll and I. Steve said he wanted to do between 30-50 miles and to keep a chill pace. Perfect! I wasn't 100% sure about how I was going to do anyway since I was still coming back from the huge effort I put in for the Single Speed Century. In fact, I was battling sudden bouts of wanting to fall asleep at random times as late as Friday afternoon! My body felt 'okay' for the first time since the SSC ride on Friday though, so that was a positive. Plus, since I had to use the truck to haul some stuff, I didn't ride my bike Friday either. I suppose a day off was in order. Anyway, the point being I wasn't sure I could hang.

So......what did I do? I decided to ride the Stormchaser single speed one last time for the review I am doing on it for RidingGravel.com. Yep! hair of the dog and all of that! But I also figured Steve would appreciate it since he is a huge fan of Salsa Cycles and I figured since Stormchasers are about as rare as hen's teeth that he may want to check one out close up. I was right in my assumptions and Steve got a kick out of seeing the bike in action.

Round bales in the distance. The corn is up everywhere now, so green is once again the dominant color in the country.

We took Steve up Schenk Road since there is a lot of barn scenery up that way.

Last weekend I said Jeremy and I hit 'the weather jackpot', and well, we did again this weekend also! I suppose the heavy East/Southeast wind could be pointed at as being a bad thing, but whatever! The temperatures were perfect and the humidity was low. We were not stressing about the wind. Here in Iowa, (and elsewhere on the Great Plains), you get used to it, because if you don't, you will go crazy. It isn't worth going crazy over.

Barns for Jason

The "Gnome Sanctuary", so named by N.Y. Roll, seen alongside Schenk Road.

Ironically, Steve and N.Y. Roll were so deep in a conversation that I think they missed the most of the sights of Schenk Road. Well, that is until we passed by the "Gnome Sanctuary", as N.Y. Roll calls it. There we had to stop and consider the handiwork of some resident there depicting a small village of gnome sized buildings. It's amazing what you will find out in the countryside if you are willing to explore it by bicycle.

Barns for Jason: Southern Bremer County here.

Rolling Westward with a tailwind.

We ended up deciding to take in Ivanhoe Road, and since that was the case, I thought about going by the old German schoolhouse, the Maxfield School, that was on the same road to Ivanhoe Road anyway. It was perfect. I figured it would be of some interest to Steve.

As we turned to go West, the wind was at our backs and N.Y. Roll and Steve, being on geared bikes, had an advantage on me. The terrain was flat, so I ran out of a 'comfortable gear' a lot sooner, and they walked away from me for a bit. That didn't last long once they realized I was off the back, and then they slowed their pace a bit.

One of those big Ag sprayer machines coming up the road from the South here. 

N.Y. Roll's bike at the Maxfield Schoolhouse. Looking a little worse for wear these days!

We stopped briefly at the Maxfield School for images and then we hit the road again to show Steve Ivanhoe Road. Steve lit up at one point when he  realized he was physically seeing things with his own eyes he's seen here on the blog. That was a fun moment.

Then we headed South back into Black Hawk County, taking in the new Ivory Road bridge along the way. I suggested we turn East on Marquise Road so we could show Steve the two churches on Burton Avenue. That meant we had a slog into heavy East winds for several miles. We put our heads down and pedaled.

We passed a tanker with whatever they were spraying on a nearby field in it. 

Rest stop on the lawn of the East Janesville Church adjacent to the cemetery.

Steve called for some shade and rest, so the East Janesville Church grounds looked like a great spot to do just that. We hung out for about a half an hour, chatting and taking in some calories. Then it was time to hit the road and finish off the loop. We had one more item to show Steve. The 'iron dinosaurs' on the place on the West side of the road just South of Dunkerton Road on Burton Avenue.

A crew baling 'square bales'. The old school way! You don't see this much in Iowa anymore.

Lots of spraying going on this past weekend. It didn't seem like a great idea, to us, since it was so windy.

We saw the ironwork and then proceeded into town where Steve said he wanted to buy us a round of beers. Well......okay! N.Y. Roll really wanted to have us stop at the German style beer garden downtown first, so that's what we did. Then it was off to Singlespeed for a couple and more conversation.

Steve had to get an image of Waterloo's cement elephant, a remnant of an old recreational park for kids, now located in Exchange Park. 

It was great to see Steve again. He's the 'captain' of the Gent's Race team I have been a part of, so I generally have been able to see him at least once a year, sometimes twice at another event, every year. But with the cancellation of that event, it seemed as though I'd miss seeing those folks at all this year. Getting to see Steve was a treat then. Thanks Steve for coming up! I really enjoyed our afternoon together, and the beers afterward.