Touring Webster City

This is a girl-trip as you will remember. Which means our first stop was a Convenience store with a ladies room. Oh, and we needed some ice and drinks and such. But we were saving most of our appetites for the promised pie, pasta and pork chops. Which would have to wait, as CaDiva started chatting with the store manager. For a woman who never recognizes flirting when it is offered, she sure does attract it. While we waited for her, HRH and I checked out the youngster in the parking lot, gesticulating wildly with a small cardboard square sign.

You couldn't actually read the sign since it was written in ball point pen and a 23-point font. Regardless, the saying is true ... and a little child shall lead... Just as CaDiva wandered out of air-conditioned mini-mart we signaled PORK CHOP HO!!!! The youngster was directing us down the hill behind the store where a welcoming aroma wafted down wind to our waiting nostrils...Pork Chop on a Stick. $5.00

We didn't know what else would be available in our travels, so we split one of the moist, peppery, slow-cooked, blond steaming treasures wrapped in aluminum foil and impaled on a skewer. And it was MAGNIFICENT. As we wiped our chins, we considered getting a few more but we still hadn't found the campsite at this point.

With pork chop down and two points of our triangle of dietary treasure hunt before us, we climbed back into the car and headed to the campsite. As I explained, we were successful in setting up camp but after you have staked out your territory, it is inviolate and you can apparently just leave for sight-seeing or pie-hunting.  That's what HRH said anyway and she is the only one of the three of us who found sleeping in the out of doors an acceptable alternative to the cool, crispness of an elevated sheet en-robed mattress with indoor plumbing conveniently placed. Who were CaDiva and I to argue? I mean did Jack climb up onto that floating door just because Rose closed her eyes?

We found parking near where the vendors were setting up several blocks from the brick building we targeted as the City Hall, which housed our first stop, the Information Center. Most of the vendors and presumably purveyors of pie and pasta, were still setting up since they knew the bulk of bikers wouldn't hit town until noon or later. So we would have to live on our 1/3 of the pork chop for a bit longer. Besides, HRH was anxious to find out if that bike path so near our campsite truly was the start of her grand adventure. Not to mention CaDiva wanted to get some idea how to find the support driver's route.

The volunteers at City Hall were very helpful and informative, not to mention apologetic for the locked bathrooms. We got maps, directions, and really cute little bicycle pins. No one actually mentioned the wearing of our wristbands would get us discounts on food and souvenirs, but apparently we would know that if we read the directions. Who Knew?

We found a slightly cooler than the hinges of hell shaded bench to wait until the official Ragbrai licensed vendor was able to vend. She didn't have any money even though we promised to spend so much she wouldn't need to give us change but there were rules and such. As I waited there, I struck up a conversation with an obviously experienced biker who turned out to be HRH's neighbor. Yeah, from home...but that is the way when you go anywhere with HRH, you are going to run into someone she knows.

By this time we gave up on the licensed vendor and decided to wander down to the corridor of vendors back where we parked the car. The buildings provided a pleasant amount of shade and we got in plenty of people watching until we found the food vendors were up and over several more blocks in the unshaded parts of town.

Do you know how hot concrete gets on a 106 degree day? According to the thermometer in the car it was 120 degrees. When we finally got to the corridor of food we had to park CaDiva on a porch stoop. HRH and I went in hunt for the promised pie and pasta. After walking to the end of the food vendors and back we ended up with gyros, turkey sandwich and the best Lemonade we drank since DC in '76 (but that is a whole other story - remind me to tell you about losing a rented fire-engine red Merc Cougar during a march on Washington).

Actually, HRH found the lemonade. CaDiva was giving the mom a report of our activities thus far when she saw HRH approach with the icy golden nectar. CaDiva reached out like the little hrh after she spotted a cookie. HRH asked her if she wanted a drink. At that point CaDiva opened up her big green eyes very wide and let her lower lip quiver slightly as she asked, "You mean it wasn't for me?"

As for me, I brought back water for CaDiva but as long as HRH was offering to get the lemonade I said, sure bring me one. I mean if you can't get pie or pasta, you should at least get lemonade. Right? Yeah, that's what I thought too.

After we ate, we decided not to worry about dinner until after Not Hank and TWC arrived and we began the long trudge back to the car. Funny, it was parked in the same place we left it but it was a lot further walking back than it had been when we started the meander through town.

But it is late now and I still have the tale of dinner and Three Dog Night so I'll sign off tonight and fill you in on the rest tomorrow. I will also go through the pictures HRH let me download from her camera and you can see what we saw in my next few posts.