Team 2 Albany MN to Minneapolis

We started out this morning in our favorite way, by going absolutely bananas at the continental breakfast and stashing lots of food for lunch. I think I made like 10 pancakes in total. They had one of those machines where you just press a button and a pancake like magically starts getting made on a cute little conveyer belt. Love those things. We were sad to set off without Rogan/Olivia. Olivia was needing a few days off after toughing it out on antibiotics for over a week, and we're going to take a bus to meet us in Wisconsin. The morning was pretty smooth rolling, as we took a bike path the first 20 miles until we reached St. Cloud. We then randomly started chatting with this older gentleman who started telling us about a bike route that took you all the way from St cloud to Minneapolis... We were intrigued. After getting spoiled with bike paths over the last two days we started to reconsider our route for the day. Instead of heading north of Minneapolis to Dalbo, should we just b-line it through Minneapolis on this bike route (called the MRT - Mississippi River Trail). We decided, yes, yes we should. We checked the mileage and determined it would be a 95 mile day instead of a 68 mile one. We all have our consent and we on our way. Before long, we found ourselves on complicated city roads, just itching to get back on a bike path. About 15 miles in we finally found a bike path, the. We double checked our maps and our hearts dropped... It was 12pm and we have 81 miles left?!? How could this be?? Somehow we had misinterpreted the Google maps information and had signed ourselves up for a 112 mile day, not a 95 mile day. A little shell shocked and concerned, we decided to keep moving in hopes that we could make it to camp by a reasonable hour. By about 4pm, after hours in the hot sun on county roads (very few bike paths involved on the MRT), with 50 miles left to go, we decided to call it and looked for a place to stay that was closer than our original plan. My mom graciously donated some of her Marriot points and we booked a hotel right off the MRT in downtown Minneapolis. Just as we were pulling into city limits, it started to get windy, and dark. Yes folks, it was then that the skies decided to open up on us. With 8 miles to go, we kept pushing. Through bike paths that never seemed to go straight and has unlimited junctions with no signage, we trudged on. In a moment of poor judgement, as we crossed a street and noticed a bike path just past a curb, I seems to forget that I was not on a mountain bike and tried to jump the curb with fully loaded panniers, in the rain. Needless to say, that ended poorly and I was flung from my bike as my tires slipped out from under me. Somehow I landed on two feet relatively unscathed, but a little spooked. As I started riding I realized that my back was quite sore, but nothing too crazy. Right as we were rolling into downtown Minneapolis, the storm cleared and we appreciated how beautiful the city was. There was this modern industrial vibe everywhere, string lights, food trucks, things that make me very happy. We pulled up to the hotel and locked our bikes in the garage adjacent to the hotel. As I checked in, I asked the staff if there was a safer place where we could store the bikes, and he said the garage should be just fine. We went up to our room and got cleaned up before heading out to grab some food. Maura and I went to get some sushi at a conveyer belt sushi restaurant and had such a fun time. When we got back, I went to go check on the bikes and was met with a horrible realization... Maura's bike was gone. A panic set in and as we tried to reconcile what had just happened. We ran to the front desk to let them know what was going on and ask for help. We were met with "we are not responsible for any lost or stolen goods" multiple times before this incredibly unhelpful woman went to get us the phone number for the security that's as supposed to have access to the cameras that were pointed right at our bikes. The unhelpfulness continued as the seemingly confused security guard said 'we can't rewind the tapes'. And of course he was not watching the feed when the bike got stolen. At this point we had come to accept that the bike was gone and started to make a game plan for what we were going to do. I called my parents and told them what had happened, and within minutes they found an REI within 6 miles that had Maura's exact bike in stock. We were relieved to have access to such a thing, but heart broken at the loss and the cost that this was going to be put on Maura. The bike alone was worth $1300. We tried to relax and enjoy the fact that we were at least in a hotel room instead of camping that night. At 4am I woke up and could not sleep, feeling so anxious for Maura. At that point we decided that we needed to start a GoFundMe for her, and see if we could raise at least some money to help cover the cost of getting a replacement. To our absolute amazement, before 10am, the GoFundMe had nearly $1700 in it. We could not believe it. Our gratitude could not be put into words. I could see the weight lifted off Maura's shoulders and was so happy. Right at open, we were at REI getting Maura's new bike/gear. By 2pm, we were on the road.