Rambling through the Years
2025 marks the 15th anniversary of the first Mankato River Ramble, which hit the road ~ and trails ~ on October 9, 2011. This is also the 20th anniversary of the bicycle tour that sparked my desire to start a Classic-style ride in Mankato.
On September 4, 2006, I joined David Minge and a group of 45 bicyclists, all members of the Parks and Trails Council of Minnesota. The ride began in Minneopa State Park ~ with its gorgeous two-tiered waterfall ~ and followed a route almost identical to the Ramble’s 42-mile Lake Crystal Loop. We stopped at the Rapidan Dam Cafe and Minnemishinona County Park ~ two rest stops on the future Ramble.
I loved the ride, the route, the parks and knew this had excellent potential for an organized tour. Then I looked at local trail maps and realized there was a 12-mile all trail route that would make an excellent family ride. Next step ~ get the Bike Alliance involved and luck into Tom Engstrom and the Greater Mankato Bike & Walk Advocates (GMBWA).
October 9, 2011
GMBWA, led till the very end by Tom Engstrom, put in the work, the weather gods smiled and over 1,000 riders (backed by 30 sponsors) convened at Land of Memories to kick off the first Ramble. Enjoy a Daycation! The Ride Guide crowed. The Saint Paul Classic Bike Tour and print marketing was in its prime. We printed up 75,000 guides and mailed over 30,000 to “Our Bicycling Friends,” promoting both the Classic and the Ramble. Artwork by graphic design whiz, Adam Turman.
We touted just two routes, the Lake Crystal Loop and the Minneopa Falls Loop. Riders that first year discovered what instantly became our most popular route in 2012 ~ the Pie Run. The first seven years featured another favorite. Linda Engstrom baked several hundred cookies to be devoured at the Minneopa State Park Rest Stop.
There was fresh coffee at Land of Memories and the Rapidan Dam Rest Stop but the real Classic touch was live music at every stop. I’ve already saluted Ron Arsenault but Dave Ross deserves a round of applause for kicking off each Ramble with the Organic Cowboys. It’s not easy playing guitar with your gloves on. After his early morning gig he hopped on his bike and swept the course as a ride marshal.
Many musicians play with a variety of bands. Dave and Mike Pengra often play with Ron, as they did here with the Fabulous Fatheads. Laura Schultz and Colin Scharf are a musical couple that played the Ramble most years. Sister Gin, The Bockfest Duo and Rain Dogs complete the first year’s roster.
October 7, 2012
The 1901 Red Jacket Trail Trestle is featured on Roberta Avidor’s cover artwork and the panoramic view over the LeSueur River Valley is a highlight for every rider. We officially add the 26-mile Pie Run and the Ramble is well on the way to being outstate Minnesota’s most popular ride. Jenny Barnes makes the pies, volunteers brew up fresh coffee and if you’ve worked up an appetite; stop in the Dam Store for the Best Dam Hamburgers around. This year’s music line-up was an encore from 2011.
October 6, 2013
One Great Ride ~ Four Scenic Routes headlines the Ride Guide. This year a sdetrip is featured to a National Literary Landmark, Maud Hart Lovelace’s childhood home. The adored author of the Betsy-Tacy book series grew up in Mankato and her house is now a museum open to the public.
The music lineup has the Fabulous Fatheads at Land of Memories with the Jim McGuire Jazz Trio at Minneopa State Park. String Theory at Minnemishinona really impresses me with songs from their CD, What’s the Matter with Captain Gravitone. Artwork by Bob Williams.
October 5, 2014
Generous sponsorship by the Mankato Clinic and The Orthopaedic & Fracture Clinic allow the Ramble to offer free rides for children and teens 17 and under. Unheard of in the organized bike tour business. Women’s T-shirts are offered for the first time but the biggest new offering is the Hilly Half Century. Riders light out to the tiny town of Garden City.
Joe Kunkel’s Bullypulpit Bluegrass Band took the stage at Rapidan Dam and kept it. Colin and Laura’s new group, Good NIght Gold Dust were at Minnemish and Raven Moon Rising played Lake Crystal, which was upgraded from a water stop to a full fledged rest stop sponsored by the local chamber and Julie Reed. Dan Duffy Orchestra played swing tunes at Minneopa. Artwork for 2014 through 2017 is by Brian Stark ~ whose company prints all our T-shirts.
October 11, 2015
The harvest-time tour continues to grow as it showcases Mankato’s colorful wooded trails, quiet country roads and dramatic river crossings in the “Deep Valleys” made famous by Maud Hart Lovelace. On his way to fame, and 50 miles on the Hilly Half Century is Mankato resident and future Governor Tim Walz.
The Ramble now sports Dan Urlick, host of KMCU’s Bike Ride show, as MC. City Mouse headlines the main stage at L of M some 40 years after their founding. Jazz veterans Larry McDonough and Richard Terrill Quartet, Paul Durenburger, and the Tombstone Trio are also on the bill.
October 9, 2016
The ride remains the same though this is the last year for the Hilly Half Century. The music lineup is also quite similar though the Tombstone Trio now goes by Honkabilly. The Porchlights debut with songs from Ghost in Time at L of M. Also making their first appearance are the bison at Minneopa State Park.
October 8, 2017
Make it an Adventure Weekend! we declare in promoting a “Prairie Safari” through the bison enclosure at Minneopa. New mountain bike trails funded through GMBWA and the Ramble are also a hit.
We try our last new ride. The 58-mile Good Thunder Loop takes ambitious Ramblers to see Ta-coumba Aiken’s giant silo mural next to the town square, where The Misty Trio (Laura and Colin and Wyatt) play standards from days of yore. Billy and the Bangers close out Land of Memories.
October 7, 2018
Dana Sikkila has an art gallery in downtown Mankato and designed one of my favorite covers. The ride has now settled into the three standard routes though road construction adds four miles to the Pie Run and Minneopa Falls Loop. Over 400 riders do the Lake Crystal Loop each year and look forward to the famed “Elevator Shaft,” a precipitous plunge down into the Minnesota River Valley.
The Fabulous Minnesota Barking Ducks entertain the faithful at Minnemishinona while The Old Guy (Mark Braun) and the Kid (grandson Kaleb) play originals and classics at Lake Crystal.
October 6, 2019
Ta-coumba’s silo mural in Good Thunder is impressive and so is Australian artist Guido van Helten’s hundred-foot-tall grain silo mural on the edge of Mankato. We added two miles through North Mankato so long route riders can see them.
Nate Boots and the High Horses close out the Ramble at Land of Memories. Little do we know that this will be the last pre-Covid ride. It’s a great one with beautiful weather and almost 1,800 registered riders.
October 11, 2020
The Covid year. Perhaps you remember this. GMBWA and BikeMN did an October-long DIY River Ramble where you filled out a form, competed for prizes and could purchase a T-shirt.
I took a different path, celebrating the 10th Anniversary with the Mural to Mural Ride. This was a 28-mile DIY Invitational Ride that connected Guido van Helten’s downtown silo mural (2020) with Ta-coumba Aiken’s silo mural (1988) in Good Thunder. It utilized the Red Jacket Trail and the recently paved shoulder of County Road 1 to connect the two monumental murals. Art by Casey Christenson in 2019 and 2020.
October 10, 2021
The world ~ especially events designed to bring people together ~ had changed. The Saint Paul Classic was completely reimagined (See Classic History tab on the Bike Classic.org website.) and this had a profound effect on how both rides were marketed. In past years, a 12-page Ride Guide was printed promoting the two tours. In 2019 we printed 90,000 guides and mailed them to 49,000 bicycling households. Yeah. Those days were over. BikeMN talked up the rides in their newsletter ~ Big Rides are Back! headlined Shift ~ but the bulk of the marketing now was via email.
The 2021 Ramble unfolded as it usually did ~ riders chose one of the three scenic routes first employed in 2012, there was fresh coffee, lots of local baked goods and plenty of pie. Dave Ross debuted his new band, Shape of Walter, Bee Balm Fields played L of M and Chris Bertand was out in Lake Crystal. The brilliant artwork was by Kat Baumann.
October 9, 2022
Why mess with a winner. The Ramble was up to its usual tricks ~ One Great Ride, Three Scenic Routes. In 2021, the Classic (no longer on closed roads) and Ramble were both about the same size with 1,850 to 1,900 riders (perhaps our biggest Ramble by the numbers). The day of ride weather this year was not a winner and the ride drew a disappointing 1,300 Ramblers. Artwork by Kat Baumann.
Ron Arsenault celebrated his birthday with his band of musical brothers, the Lost Walleye Orchestra. Eric Zimmerman’s EZ Jazz Trio followed them at L of M and the Gold Dust Duo ~ yes, that’s Laura and Colin, played out at Minnemishinona. Please note that when I first started the Ramble my biggest challenge was to smoothly say the name of the county park.
October 8, 2023
Who knew that this would be the River Ramble’s last dance. But it was a great one. We had excellent weather and a grand return to form with 1,768 registered riders and no major spills. The Best Harvest Time Tour celebrated its 13th anniversary with two days of organized rides ~ the Saturday Sakatah Scramble drew about 100 riders, but the Guided Family Ride on Sunday was a bust. The song ~ bands and musicians ~ remained the same though Crista Bohlman was a big hit out at Minnemish. Lovely artwork by Ellen Schofield.
October 6, 2024
I loved the first draft of Dinah Langsjoen’s artwork and was happy to pay her though it would never see the light of day. I’m sure the River Ramble would still be rolling if BikeMN’s founding director and old friend, Dorian Grilley, was still around. I only met the new director once and he was only interested in one thing. Taking over both rides.
All’s well that ends well
Tom Engstrom, Lee Ganske and the entire GMBWA gang can never be thanked enough for making the Mankato River Ramble the biggest and best bicycle tour in the land. Howard Rosten was not in the GMBWA photo (above) but attended meetings, drove the truck on ride day, provided a couple hundred safety cones and was a great help to the end.
Jack Rayburn was Tom’s friend and right-hand man on ride day. Michelle Melby ran the Minnemishinona rest stop every year and nobody ran a better organized waystation. Except maybe Linda Engstrom at Minneopa State Park, who for several years baked about 1,000 cookies for the ride. Kathy Leggett was the volunteer coordinator for many years. Richard Keir wrangled the ride marshals and Karen Christy dealt with recycling, composting and more.
Tom Engstrom deserves the biggest round of applause. It was his initiative that launched the Ramble and his hard work that made it successful year after year. He brought in the entire Mankato and North Mankato community, personally recruiting over 50 sponsors ~ more than the Classic ever mustered.
Lee Ganske was there from the beginning as well, and working into Tom’s leadership position (plus taking over responsibility for housing me and my buddy Dave Carlson the weekend of the ride) when the curtain came down.
I recall the first time the GMBWA committee met. We were discussing different aspects of producing a big bike tour and the not insignificant matter of the name came up. River Ramble was a given ~ there were as many as eight river crossings on the ride ~ and the Mankato River Ramble seemed a simple call. But North Mankato didn’t want to be left out. The vote may have even been to call it the Kato River Ramble but as an interloper I insisted we keep it recognizable to outsiders.
It took 15 years but those first GMBWA members now have their wish ~ the Kato Fall Bike Fest hits the ground riding on September 27 and 28, 2025. There will be BMX, bike polo, gravel rides and for those who wax nostalgic, the Ramble’s original 12-mile Minneopa Falls Loop is still there for you.
Best of luck! Ramble on my friends!
Richard Fred Arey ~ founder of the Mankato River Ramble and Saint Paul Classic Bike Tour