A sprinkle, was all. Nothing to stop a planned 50-mile ride out to St. Bonifacius on the nearly completed Dakota Rail Regional Trail. Next week, we have a four-day ride through Wisconsin, and we wanted to check our legs.
Riding in the rain would also allow us to check our resolve.
The new trail runs 13.5 miles from the western fringe of downtown Wayzata off Ferndale Rd. and follows an old rail right of way along Lake Minnetonka to St. Boni. A portion runs through Minnetonka Beach, an exclusive community that resisted the trail's construction.
Here's a stretch that parallels a narrow residential street. At each driveway, marked with a stop sign for bikes, the asphalt changes to white herringbone pavers. I don't know if this is a safety feature or to signify the status of the homes behind the shrubbery. A friend was berated here yesterday for running one of the driveway stop signs.
A little after 1:00. we made St. Boni just this side of chilled (I'd opted for a regular jersey and arm warmers instead of a rain jacket) and ready for food. We didn't see the St. Boni Bistro, which looks worth a visit, and Subway didn't seem like a very good place to dry out. Besides, we could do Subway anywhere. And they don't have beer.
We settled on Grumpy's, a not very promising looking storefront bar on Main Street. (Not affiliated with the Grumpy's in Minneapolis.)
The bartender recommended pizza, since he could only grill one hamburger at a time. He assured us the pizza was homemade and one 12-inch would be enough for the three of us.
We asked him to load it up — the garbage pizza with the works.
Just in case he was wrong, I went with a pickled egg for a starter, passing on the pickled turkey gizzards. You know you're out of town when the back bar is stocked with jerky, pickled eggs and turkey gizzards.
Another clue was the cross-section of customers who gradually filled up the bar. Maybe it was the rain, whch had picked up, but no one stepped out for a smoke the whole time we were there.
One young fellow had come with his mother. She'd given him a dollar to play a video game, but he had to wait while a guy collected the quarters and serviced the machine.
The pizza was a good two inches thick, with plenty of cheese and enough jalapenos to make my eye sockets sweat.
The ride back, into the wind with a more insistent rain, had me questioning my choices, but once we circled back to the trail, the cold was less penetrating, and I found the groove — right between I want to quit and this isn't bad at all — that gets you through.
I suppose on a sunny day the bar still would've been friendly and the pizza several notches above good.
But coming back cold, wet and grimy made everything so much better.
You either understand this or you don't.
