I posted a few photo blogs from Arkansas, but I shot video the whole time we were down there. There wasn’t enough to tell the real story, but here are some clips.
Author / jackniewold
Arkansas – day 4
We woke up a little late on day four as it was cooler, and we wanted a little later start. It ended up being our longest day, and hardest at 85 miles.
It was my favorite day.
I listened to a podcast about how barns like these are all over the country and no one bothers to tear them down.
COSCO has a fleet capacity of 256,171 of these containers. Some have gone missing.
All of the roads like these are virtually car-less and when we do come across them, they are courteous and give us a lot of space.
“when one door closes another opens”
Can’t remember why we dismounted.
“Baptists believe that baptism should be performed only for professing believers and that it must be done by complete immersion.”
Approaching federal territory
Shoutout to Chase for putting up with my stops and incessant need for food and my crankiness when I don’t get it.
Many layers of paint on this old grocery store
I scarfed down about 1000 calories worth of muffins and peanut butter rice krispy treats.
There was a (cow) calf that was standing about 50 yards away from this herd of water buffalo. It looked lonely. We thought it might be lost.
Every day we’ve been treated to an amazing sunset.
Arkansas – day 3
Day three was listed in my TrainingPeaks as the ‘Climbing Day.’ Wake up call was early as it was a long day and we had to drive to the start point. We drove down to Fayetteville for a hilly route where we could check out some of the courses we’ll be riding on this spring. We parked in South Fayetteville and rode out.
Rollout was a little damp but it was the type of wetness that more or less stuck to the road-we didn’t need ass savers. We had no idea it had rained during the night, and the further south we got the wetter it got
We rode parts of the collegiate race course (Mar 4-5) and then rode on some of the JMSR RR course, meandering over to Devils Den. I climbed the TT Course twice, and Chase added on one race pace effort. I took pictures.
Tried to make this not look like a selfie.
Very bottom of the climb.
I thought this shack looked like the ones we have at Camp Randall in Madison. They kept the Civil War POWs in the ones in Madison. This one they probably keep chicken feed or something.
Lot of these signs around. People kinda do whatever they want on their property, at least in the rural areas.
Downtown Winslow. Three establishments in a very old building: the city hall (open Mo-Wed 9-3), the city museum (don’t recommend it), and the Winslow Mercantile (now defunct). The lady in the city hall let us fill up our bottles, and told us that we were lucky with the weather. “We know,” we said. She said there was an ice storm over New Years.
One of the more friendly looking dogs, even though it chased us. Chase starts sprinting if he sees a dog, I slow down and get scared.
The Winslow Train Station.
We’ve been cursed with a flat every day this trip. This one was after some road work, with only a few miles to go.
Our second choice of restaurants, after Waffle House. Chick-Fil-A has the highest sales per restaurant of any fast food chain.
Best part of the day was the weather. Hit 70 and the sun was out for a little bit. We haven’t seen the blue sky in Minnesota for a while, and I was so happy we got a chance.
Arkansas – day 2
Sometime in November, my good friend and teammate for 2017, Chase Wark asked me if I wanted to go somewhere over winter break. I said sure. We decided on a week in Northwest Arkansas. I’ve been in a goal setting (and keeping) phase lately, and I had three for this trip
1. Keep the trip under 300 dollars
2. Recon the courses for Joe Martin Stage Race (one of our team’s target races for the year)
3. Ride a lot
I took some video the first day down and I’ll try to edit that. Today, some pictures.
We’re renting out a room in a super cheap, super nice Airbnb. It’s a beautiful home in Bentonville, home of Walmart. The hosts are two lovely, generous British women.
We saw three armadillos the first day. I’ve never seen one up close and they’re honestly kind of spooky. I hate how their shell is reticulated.
We hit three states in one day-Arkansas, Missouri, and Oklahoma.
Chase has been a great sport and super flexible travel partner. We took his Grandma’s car down (pictured)
Chase was in charge of riding routes. I was cranky that we ended up on this gravel. I ended up flatting on this stretch. A couple dozen cows wandered over to watch me change the tube. You can see them in the field in the right.
Jack Niewold 