Northwest Iowa — The populations of Orange City and Spencer are basically back to normal after a large influx of people coming to town for the RAGBRAI bike ride.
Estimates are that Orange City’s normal population of 6200 nearly tripled in size on Saturday night as bicyclists, support people and others came to town for what amounted to the party before the ride. Orange City Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Mike Hoffman said most of the downtown area served as the beer garden for the festivities. On the other hand, he says a special church service was part of the activities as well, with people from the Lifelight Christian Music Festival helping out.
As usual, riders and others started to trickle in on Friday, but the majority arrived on Saturday in anticipation of the ride. On Sunday morning, bikes headed south on K64 and rode through Alton, Granville, Paullina, and Primghar, where they could meet up with support vehicles if they needed to. From there, some riders took a gravel loop through Sutherland before they and the others visited Hartley and then stopped for the night in the Sunday overnight town, Spencer.
On Monday, they’ll pedal from Spencer to Algona. Other overnight stops this week include Clear Lake, Charles City, Cresco and Waukon. The ride will conclude Saturday in Lansing.
