Day 1 Sunday, July 20th, 1997- Missouri Valley to Red Oak- 82 miles and 3,403 vertical feet (up)

Conditions- Very Hot! - Quite Hilly- Headwind going South (half the ride)

First of all, I must apologize. A few of these were saved in grayscale. Norm saved the day with his pics, however. It will become quickly evident who the real photographer is! Thanks, Norm. Ragbrai fans- would you send me some of yours and I'll post yours and give you credit!

Here are your hosts, Norm, Bruce, Ruie, and Dave the night before the ride start.

On Saturday evening, we went shopping and mega people watching. On this two mile walk, we saw a couple of rather interesting team buses, Team Splat, and the Pickle Bar's Coolbus

DAY 1, Sunday- We left Missouri Valley at 7 AM and all went quite well. Just out of Underwood we saw a Dr. Seuss version of a bike that I'd really like to ride! You would never have to say "On your left", just run over them. We noticed for the first time in the four Ragbrais that I've ridden a different type of crop terracing. Here's a terraced soybean field.

Soon after, Norm "found" a spot where a non Ragbrai fan has sprinkled a whole bunch of thumbtacks in the road. Unfortunately, he found them the hard way and we were seperated for about 30 miles. While waiting for them to catch up, I had breakfast from Paul Bernhard, the Pork Chop man in the town of Underwood

The terrain was very challenging on this first day of Ragbrai. I would venture to say that this may have been one of the most difficult first days considering the terrain, the heat, and the sheer distance. Here's one of Norm's real neat hill photos to give you an idea of this first day. This one was taken just South of Oakland.

I met some real helpful friends, Sorenson's Computer Connection, Inc. These folks set up a direct Internet connection for Ragbrai riders to send and receive their email on the ride. They are speeding up my process tonight as I will be using their facilities to upload the pictures.

People met -

Glenn Milden and Andrea Ber of Roselle, Illinois