Day 29

Iowa City, IA ➡️ Rockford, IL

Another 14 mile day in the books, and another state line crossed. Today we ran into Rockford, Illinois, where we are staying at our first YMCA. I ran for Jim B., the brother of a family friend, who recently passed away from cancer.

Going through Iowa has been about how we expected it to be - we pretty much just run through back roads cutting through lots of corn fields in very rural areas. Getting chased by dogs is not uncommon in 4K on the rural roads where a lot of times dogs are not secured by leashes or electric fences; it seems to be a theme in Iowa, which makes for an interesting experience. Today we passed by a barn with a bunch of cows that came out to greet us first thing in the morning, which made our day. I'm starting to miss the miles and miles of cow pastures that we have been passing in the past few states! Sometimes the cows will run alongside us (behind the fence of course), and there are a lot of adorable baby cows that have made our runs more exciting.

Other than the corn and some cows, nothing too unusual happened today. We did get a delicious meal provided by a local store owner, and it was the first fully nutritious meal that we've had in a while, which was awesome! Roasted sweet potatoes with cinnamon, quinoa salad, lots of fruit, and chicken with peppers made for a great meal that was pretty out of the ordinary for 4K. We're always happy to eat pizza or whatever meal we can get donated, but we were especially grateful for a healthy meal.

Can't wait for Chicago tomorrow!