At Ogden Ave. I said good bye and headed down Ogden to catch up with
the starved rockers. After climbing abandoned Joliet road over bottomless
quarries, we made our way past battling car dealerships and down into the
canal zone. Travelling for some miles along the superb I&M canal trail
we were treated to a frog symphony. At about midnight we reached Lemont
where the dozen starved rockers would spend the night.

[webmaster note: here, Gareth and Adrian depart from the Canal Rockers. Follow there progress in pictures and a writeup by Michael B.]

Adrian and I decided to keep riding and a couple hours later arrived
at the Fox River Valley greeted by torrential thunderstorms.
After much wet riding through Aurora's island downtown looking for
some food or shelter other than the casino we decided that we should
just continue up north along the scenic fox river trail system. Finally
at dawn we stopped at a picnic shelter in Batavia and built a fire to
warm and dry ourselves and socks. We managed a shivering 15 minute nap
before being interrupted by a Park maintenance crews, and police. So off
we continued stopping often to switch from wet socks to damp socks.

We went up the Fox River Trail through the quaint and picturesque
downtowns of Batavia, Geneva, and St. Charles, past remnants of the Elgin
Joliet and Aurora railway where old CTA equipment still runs on the S.Elgin
trolley museum tracks. Over bridges hopping from island to island from one
side of river to the other, dodging geese, mosquitos and the occasional
cyclist. Into Elgin's diverse, walkable, and hilly downtown. Past it's
tacky river boat casino through tunnels, and over trestles.

Finally the Fox River trail becomes the Prairie Trail (not PrairiePath).
Near Crystal Lake we encountered the craziest ravines and moraines giving
an excellent roller coaster ride through dense forest and dunes. We passed a
series of conveyor belts that ran for a few miles for quarrying sand.
We took this north until the village of Ringwood, where it continues flat
cutting through the hills as train tracks do but was wet and the asphalt
had given way to gravel and mud. It starting to rain, and not having slept
the night before we took a room in the outskirts of Richmond, Il.

The next morning (Sunday) we set off across the cheddar curtain into
Wisconsin. Passing through a cold but lively LakeGeneva we bought espresso, cheese, bread and blankets. After many arduous hills we arrived in HickoryWoods at KettleMoraine (south unit) where we received a very nice welcome from 16 or so mostly messengers who had a nice tent city and cozy fire. Though the off-road trails were closed there were plenty of fun hills to play on especially if one had gears as I did. Amazingly in addition to several of the
campers having single speed bikes one did the Chicago-KettleMoraine-Chicago
180 mile trip on a fixed gear track bike!

Monday morning we all rode south on county roads through rolling hills
and farms, past a parade in downtown Elkhorn. At the Illinois border we took
route 12 which is nearly suicidal. For miles this virtual expressway has no
shoulder and for our safety we had to take a lane relying on the cursing,
honking cars behind us to function as a shield protecting us from the 60 mile
per hour traffic behind.

All totaled, the Chicago-Lemont-FoxRiver-KettleMoraine-Chicago trip was
about 300 miles making it my longest weekend jaunt!

Gareth