Leg 1, Ride 1: Madison to Madison

Hey, it's our first riding day of the trip! A real arduous slog today: almost 14 whole miles!

We kept today's ride really short because it's our first road bike ride of the entire year, and because we wanted to have plenty of time to deal with any problems we might discover once we actually started pedalling.

As it turned out, the only small issue is that Marna's front wheel went a bit out of true in shipping... something we missed when we assembled the bikes a couple of days ago. Fairly quick fix.

Today's ride was almost exclusively on Madison city bike paths, from Marna's brother Sam's house on the west side to our budget motel on the east side. Madison is a great place for cycling: tons of separated bikeways, plus a network of "bike boulevards" (quiet streets designated as safe spaces for cyclists), and then plenty of on-street bike lanes.

Our trip is a small sample size, but we saw 100% of cars actually stop at all crosswalks -- Boston is getting better at this over time, but we've got a ways to go to catch up to Madison.

It's so weird to be riding a loaded touring bike after a whole winter of riding an electric cargo bike. At first, it felt like my front end was going to slide out at every corner. I got more acclimated to the feel later in the ride.

Before our ride today, we had a great couple of days in Madison!

We stayed with Marna's parents for two nights, then Marna's brother for one night.

Marna's parents showed us around Downtown Madison for a bit. I've been here before, but it's been a long long time. Madison's great. I feel like people from outside Wisconsin underrate Madison, because this is easily the second-coolest place in the state. However, I feel like people from Wisconsin overrate Madison, because it's only the second-coolest place in the state.

It was so nice to see Marna's family, especially so because this is my first time getting out here since Marna's parents moved to a new house. Also, Sam and Rachel were huge helps with trip logistics. Having a place to ship and re-assemble bikes is really a huge huge deal.

We also got to see some of Marna's old friends, who I haven't seen in years. Mary Ann has an 8-year-old daughter who didn't exist last time I was here. And, the last time I was here, Heather and Dean had two young daughters (who are now two adult daughters). It was a really nice, fun night catching up with them.

Lastly, and most importantly, it's Bruins Elimination Day!! It's really too bad I am not back in Boston to celebrate. For those of you not from Boston, Bruins Elimination Day is probably the most important holiday in Massachusetts. It's a day where all Bostonians come together to celebrate the end of the season for the hated Boston Bruins, a true black mark on an otherwise great city. It is traditional to celebrate with cake, so I had a nice big slice of carrot cake at a diner in East Madison. Let's go Sabres!