At the wedding reception of a co-worker held in the southern Minnesota tourist town of Lanesboro, fellow Wisconsin native Tim Leary and I had parked ourselves next to the appetizer table and, armed with full plastic glasses of beer, were happily talking bikes. Almost simultaneously we arrived at the conclusion that riding motorcycles instead of driving a car from our Minneapolis-St. Paul digs would have been oh-so-much more fun.
Lanesboro is located in the heart of southeastern Minnesota, a bluff-lined corner of the state bordered on the north by Highway 90 and on the east by the Mississippi River. The gently undulating countryside is roughly bisected by Highway 16, which twists along the Root River Valley. With a mix of rolling pastures, heavily wooded valleys and hills and well-kept stretches of pavement snaking through it all, the area is a great place for a weekend ride.
After reminiscing about the bounty of the corners we witnessed on the drive down that morning, our conversation moved on to the pastor at the wedding ceremony. The priest, Father Russ Scepaniak, was a character, a barrel-chested man with an easy smile and a bright, outgoing demeanor.
"That guy's really something," Tim said. "Wouldn't it be a gas to take him out for a beer and talk bikes? He's the kind of guy you know would have something interesting to say. I bet we could even come up with some parallels between riding and religion."
We had a good chuckle over that one. "Riding certainly gets you closer to nature, and," Tim laughed, "you could call leather a vestment of sorts."
It wasn't long before I made good on my vow to ride to Lanesboro. The day I set out, the sun was just coming up into a clear blue sky, and the fall air had a sharp, clean bite that tasted like you could drink it from a glass.
On Highway 25 from Barron south through Durand and down to Winona, we rolled past the weathered dairy barns of western Wisconsin. With blue sky above and the warm sun turning a cold morning into a crisp day, the morning air evoked September days spent hunting squirrels and cutting wood with my dad when I was a kid. For me, cool September breezes carry the smell of fallen oak leaves, gun oil and chainsaw exhaust.
Taking in the view as I reminisced, I mused that if God were going to take the time to visit the Midwest, he'd probably come in September. If he really wanted to take it in right, he'd ride.
My crew for the weekend included Dan Hanna and his girlfriend, Leah, Darrick Anderson and his wife, Amy, and Jason Dejoode, who had saved and scrimped for the past three years for his first motorcycle, a clean Suzuki GS750E.
Hanna is a barber who cuts hair to support his riding habit, which often includes spontaneous blasts halfway across the country on his Kawasaki KLR650. The KLR and Hanna have a knack for appearing when something interesting is happening, like, say, the Colorado 500, which Hanna spontaneously (and unofficially) joined. He also stumbled upon Travis Pastrana as he was preparing for his infamous cliff jump-and the crew borrowed Hanna's tool kit to help assemble the ramp! If riding is a religion, Hanna is a disciple to the faith.
Hanna had spent more time than any of us wandering Minnesota Valley's winding network of two-lane roads, and he was quickly designated as our tour guide.
Situated along historic Highway 61 and just north of Highway 90 on the Mississippi River, Winona was our stepping-off point into Bluff Country. Hanna led us away from the four lanes of 61 and onto Highway 43 south to Rushford, Minnesota.