A young Iowa farm boy wakes up at the crack of dawn out of habit. It is summer, so there is no school, but his days are filled to the brim with strenuous tasks. He has to rise early and feed the cows, fix the electric fence line, open up the southern pasture, and a whole other array of country kid chores. It is a pristine, if a tad dull, way to grow up. Each day he struts into his front yard to behold the loping hills of corn as far as the eye can see. Silence. Not even the breeze dares to break the holy quietude.
However, on this summer day, which is blaring hot, humid, and muggy with mosquitos, close to twenty thousand bicyclists pass the boy’s farm. He stands on the road’s shoulder, digs his toughened hands into a cooler, and passes out Iowa’s canned ale of choice, Busch Light, to the rejoicing riders.
RAGBRAI, which stands for Register’s Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa, is a week-long event that lights the usually plain fields of Iowa into a flaming ball of fun. It is the longest, largest, and oldest recreational bike tour event in the world, and absolutely the best way to travel the oft-forgotten state of beautiful, fertile Iowa.
It began fifty years ago when two newspaper columnists got the idea (and the sort of dare) to ride their bicycles across the majestic plains of Iowa, stopping at small towns along the way, and writing about what they saw. Just two guys, but then they invited friends, and slowly word began to travel of this cockamamie adventure. By the time the trip began, nearly three hundred riders were gathered to come along, and during the odyssey they picked up close to two hundred more.
And thus, RAGBRAI was born.
Since then, RAGBRAI has been held every year (with the exception of COVID 2020) and has grown in size and spectacle. Here’s the basic rub: riders travel from all over the world to the western border of Iowa, before the race begins, they dip their back tire into the Missouri River, then they ride all the way across the state, sometimes going for as much as one hundred miles a day, and when they finish, they dip their front tire into the Mississippi.
All trepidations at what sounds like an impossible challenge are immediately alleviated by the spirit of the affair. RAGBRAI is a party, people, and everyone’s invited. There are oases all along the ride, providing beer, ice cream, pork sandwiches, free water, free corn on the cob, and anything else your sore legs may desire. Many of these oases, in fact, are put on by locals who aren’t officially affiliated with the event. Old ladies bake multiple pies, families will serve coffee and doughnuts, and there’s even a rogue Libertarian who’ll pour you the stiffest gin and tonic your eyes ever did see. Aside from this, you can also try sriracha crickets, church held pasta dinners, and ice cold Busch Light served as it was meant to be served by admiring adolescents.
Many people will rent motels in the “host towns” along the way, but most people sleep in humongous communal campgrounds, for free. Every Iowa town dreams of hosting RAGBRAI. It rakes in mountains of cash for the normally quiet and desolate towns. Imagine you own a tavern in rural Iowa. The same seventeen people show up every week. You do okay, but you’re basically providing a living room for people who don’t want to be in their living rooms. Then, for one day, a miracle happens, and you suddenly are serving close to twenty thousand customers. It is like this for every business in any town that gets to host RAGBRAI. The economy is boosted, the doldrums of everyday life are briefly lifted, and it is downright fun.
Henry and Michelle Herman, frequent RAGBRAI participants and Iowa natives, express all the joys of this event.
“It’s hard really to pinpoint the spirit of the event,” Henry Herman said. “You kind of have to see it to believe it. It’s like The Garden of Eden. Everybody is nude, plunging into pools carved out of dumpsters or ponds, and just having an overall wonderful time.”
“It’s the togetherness everyone feels,” Michelle said. “It’s true that RAGBRAI is fun, but it is very challenging. Having everyone cheering each other on and supporting one another is just another big part of the fun. It’s like you’re part of a twenty thousand person family!”
Their friend, Evan Todd, known in his closest circles as “Narddawg” or simply “Nards” has an interesting story to add to the legends of community and love that surround RAGBRAI. While stopping for some free corn, he ran down a slight hill to enjoy a little slip and slide action before continuing the long trek. In doing so, he lost his wallet. Crestfallen, his anxieties were later reconciled when three days and two hundred miles later, the people who found his wallet found him.
“RAGBRAI is the only event I know of where a stranger will pedal two hundred miles over three days to return your wallet you lost at the free corn stand on your way to a roadside slip and slide,” Todd said.
And so, farm boys and girls rejoice when once a year every freak and their mother parades across the fertile acreage of gorgeous Iowa. The state may not be beautiful from the air, but from a bike seat, no matter how saddle sore, it is the greatest party that ever lived.
