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Plan and Overview - Add Details to the Dream

My first goal was to see where they said the Mississippi River started, and that is in Minnesota, at Lake Itasca, in Itasca State Park.

Minnesota has quite a number of railroad right-of-ways converted to multi-use trails, and many miles of them are paved. So, my other goal was to ride a lot of the paved trails.

In the northeast part of Minnesota are several of those trails.

• The Paul Bunyan Trail goes north 112 miles from Brainard, through Walker, to Bemidji.
• The Heartland Trail goes 77 miles. It goes east 28 miles from Park Rapids to Walker, then north 49 miles to Cass Lake. Some of that mileage around Walker is shared with the Paul Bunyan Trail.
• A short, 1.5-mile spur south of Walker called the Shingabee Trail runs to the Paul Bunyan Trail.
• A hilly, curvy, 9-mile stretch, nicknamed the "Pyrenees" by local users, goes through a woodsy area that no train has ever seen, from east of Akeley to the south end of the Shingabee trail.

(By comparison, in Michigan, the 41 mile Fred Meijer Heartland Trail is currently the longest paved trail. It runs from Alma, thru Edmore, to Greenville.)

In the southwest part of the state, where I started and finished, are several other paved trails.

• The Glacial Lakes Trail runs 25 miles from Willmar north to Paynesville.
• The Lake Wobegon Trail runs west 35 miles west from St. Joseph to Sauk Center, and has a 22-mile northeast-bound spur from Albany to the east side of US-10 north of Royalton.
• The Central Lakes Trail connects with the Lake Wobegone Trail at Sauk Center and runs 25 miles west to Fergus Falls.

My plan connected trails with local and county roads, and state and federal highways. On the next map, the boxes represent the added mileage if I chose to extend my ride by taking a different route.
I altered my routing many times during the ride, riding some stretches two, or even three, times. This is what became of my plan.
I spent quite a lot of time in the area around Walker. The map below shows that detail.

Historically, the average high temperatures were in the upper 70s - perfect for riding. The historic lows were in the upper 50s - perfect for sleeping. What a great set of conditions for this vacation.

I planned to ride 30 miles a day, for 20 days, for a 600-mile total, and take 3 rest days, for a 23-day vacation (not including round trip driving time between Michigan and Minnesota of 4 days).

I actually rode an average of 36 miles a day, for 21 days, for a 758-mile total, and still took 3 rest days (rode 17 miles), for a 775-mile total and a 24-day vacation.

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