May 9, 2023

Dear Friends,


The RAGBRAI end-town of Davenport opened up their long-term parking options yesterday afternoon. This update includes almost exactly what you can find at the link below, with a couple exceptions.


PBV Location in Davenport

At both the beginning and end of RAGBRAI, Pork Belly Ventures will be located at St. Ambrose University. Two of several long-term parking options will be located at St. Ambrose as well--for regular vehicles and oversized vehicles. We think your best bet is parking on the St. Ambrose campus. Here is a link to long-term parking in Davenport:


https://www.davenportragbrai.com/riders/order-form

We are publishing this update quickly to help you determine your parking choice. Later in the season, we will have a street address and maps of our location at St. Ambrose. We can't pinpoint our location on campus at this time.

Parking Passes

We understand that everyone who signs up for parking will receive a pass in the mail in July.


Parking Hours

Parking lots will be open for vehicle check-in on Friday, July 21 from 12PM - 8PM and Saturday, July 22 from 5AM - 9AM.


For our riders on the 1:00 PM Friday departure, we know these hours are not ideal. We have a verbal commitment that our Davenport contacts will be happy to open parking at 11:00 or earlier, and we'll keep you posted on these hours.

Other Parking Options

You'll see both a VIP and a Sheltered Parking option. We do not know the distance from these facilities to St. Ambrose. Please read the information from Davenport, which mentions their shuttles from parking facilities to other locations in Davenport. If you select an option other than parking at St. Ambrose, ALLOW PLENTY OF TIME for shuttling around town, please.

No Indoor Sleeping

We learned yesterday that there will not be an indoor sleeping option from St. Ambrose or anywhere in Davenport. (They may have a housing committee for home stays, not sure.)


Camping

Saturday night (and possibly Friday night) camping will be on the riverfront, a few miles from St. Ambrose. We don't see a map yet, but you can watch the Davenport site, link above.


We will include the camping location on our map of Davenport for the weekend of 7/21-7/22. (We will also publish a map of Davenport/St. Ambrose for 7/29, the final day of RAGBRAI.)


NOTE: For those with PBV Rental Tent Service, it begins in Sioux City on Saturday. You can take an extra night, Friday, 7/21, in Sioux City, not in Davenport. Our rental tents will not be set up in Davenport.


Hotel Reservations

Pork Belly Ventures does not have any relationships with hotels in eastern Iowa. For Thursday or Friday nights, 7/20 or 7/21, if you prefer to stay in a hotel rather than camp, please search and make your own reservations. There are a lot of hotels in the large Quad Cities metro area.

Step-by-Step Plan, Yet to Come

Normally in this update, we would spell out a step-by-step plan for Friday and Saturday--a plan for dropping off bags and bikes, parking the vehicle, and shuttling/returning to our staging area. Please hold your questions until our team has visited our staging area in Davenport. Generally, given that parking and our staging area are both located on the St. Ambrose campus, we believe this will be easier for those on our E/W Shuttle than in the past two years when parking was around a mile away! But do stand by for more detailed instructions.


ALLOW TIME. No matter how close parking may seem to our staging area on Friday and Saturday, 7/21 and 7/22, please cushion your schedule and make your plans with time to spare for way-finding, congestion, and possible surprises.

We will be learning more about Davenport, but for now, this is all we know. We will provide more information for you as we have it. In the meantime, any urgent email questions can be addressed to info@visitquadcities.com.

REGARDING BUS DEPARTURES

Many of you on our E/W Shuttle have given us your preferences. On all departures, we still have space available.


MORE SPACE AT 1 PM: For the second time, Pete has added a coach at 1:00 PM on Friday. If you or any of your group members missed out on this departure time, please login to your Detail Form and change your preference to 1:00 PM (before it fills again).


Dave is at work on creating Friday bus rosters, using the all-important group name on applications. Particularly if you want Friday, don't delay completing your Detail Form. (Dave cannot complete it for you. Like all of us, he has many responsibilities at this time of year.)


Find instructions for completing your Detail Form here:


Update #4--Choose a Departure, Your Detail Form

PADRE's Riders on Our E/W Shuttle

To all you Padre's Folks (spending the week of RAGBRAI with a fellow RAGBRAI charter, but using our E/W Shuttle), the instructions and information above relate to you, and we plan to assign everyone with Padre's to an 8:00 AM departure on Saturday. If the 8:00 departure doesn't work for any Padre's Riders, write to Dave@pkbelly.com, please.


We understand that Padre's is working to be near us in Davenport, and they have already secured a spot near us in Sioux City--making life easy for those using our shuttle.

Our Email Priorities

Sorry to say that we're behind on email. 🙂. The publication of Davenport's parking link has stimulated many questions, most of which we hope to have answered here. Our previous update regarding the Detail Form generated lots of traffic, too. Our approach will be to answer as fast as we can, giving priority to questions that have NOT been addressed in this update. Thank you for understanding!


Have a great week, friends, and we'll be in touch again soon.

Until next time,


Tammy and Pete  

Pork Belly Ventures LLC 

Tammy: 808-375-8921 c, tammy@pkbelly.com

Pete: 402-681-2613 c, pete@pkbelly.com

 www.pkbelly.com