Old friend, trusty steed and new roads

As noted last week, riding was good to me. I had 3 killer rides in a row. All different. All on the same bike, my El Mariachi. Day one was single track. Day two was bikepacking set up super commute. Day three was coffee and sunrise with my friend Ben. I topped it off over the weekend with a family ride on the Minnetonka Regional Trail, again on my El Mariachi. 

As if that recipe wasn't good enough, last Friday Ben showed me a new route out of Northfield, MN. I had passed by one of the roads before while driving but never ridden it due to the fact that it's only accessible by pavement. Not that pavement is bad or anything like that, but I had no known reason to stray from the almost all gravel route I know and love. Well, now I do. This is a killer route filled with beautiful scenery and lots of hills. I can't wait to go back.

Hope you all had a great weekend. I did. I just enjoyed my time with my family because starting later this week, my life gets crazy. That will make sense shortly, but soon I will have mountains in some of my pictures. Looking forward to having grand back drops and something other than corn and gravel roads in my pics. 

I better get going to work. Busy day today, but this is going to be one heck of a good week.

My favorite gravel route

The other day I mentioned "my favorite gravel route" to someone and they asked me if I could share it? Well...my routes often are not grounded in maps nor do I even know 99% of the road names. I don't have a GPS, they are just roads I explore and find. They are also rated by bakery stops, and food.  Today, I'm going to take you on a little visual exploration of one of my favorite routes. The pics are not from one ride, but a series of rides and experiences.

It all starts with getting out of town and weather permitting, I always ride this road in U More park in Rosemount. I love it because it is a restricted road and I don't need to share it with automobiles.

I then like to head east, south east toward Redwing and Cannon Falls. Depending on wind and how I feel, I might end up out at the Welch Village area and then work my way back to Cannon Falls.

I like to go really early in the morning so that I can get breakfast in Cannon Falls. Here is my favorite breakfast, Sausage & Egg sandwich with coffee at The Old Market DELI.

I then like to hit the Sogn Valley. The Rawland ride of a few years ago turned me onto this amazing area South of Cannon Falls. It is filled with beautiful roads and STEEP hills.

It is also filled with barns. Here is one of my favorites. I've shot this barn a few times. I have yet to make it out there for sunrise or sunset. One of these days I'll get this barn shot in the golden hours of light.

I then meander south, south east to hit Nerstrand. I've shared this before, but this is the stop at the meat market. There is also a nice convenience store. 

I then head straight east through Nerstrand Big Woods State Park. If you miss going to the convenience store, there is a nice park headquarters that has clean bathrooms and great drinking water. I think the road is County 29. Depending on how I feel, I head into Faribault to see my friend Ben at Milltown and hit the bakery & cafe next door to his shop for an egg bake and some sort of calorie rich treat.  

Once I've hit Faribault, I head back towards Northfield with a ride up Farmer's trail and then it's almost a straight shot north to Northfield where I either stop at Goodbye Blue Monday coffee shop or at the Super America for a chocolate milk.

I then head back east a bit and zig zag north on gravel all the way back to Rosemount, again through U More on my other favorite road in the county. 

In the end, I finish up with somewhere between 100-115 depending on if I make it all the way to Faribault, MN and depending on what new road I see and explore. Regardless, I always finish up tired and happy.

So...In short it goes like this. Apple Valley to Rosemount to Trego to Cannon Falls to Nerstrand to Faribault to Northfield to Farmington to Rosemount to Apple Valley. There you go. My current favorite route.