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Back to Ride Itinerary Meet the Riders Bamacyclist Home Day 29
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Back to Ride Itinerary Meet the Riders Bamacyclist Home Day 29
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| ROUTE: Topeka KS to St Joseph MO | DISTANCE: 89 Miles | WINDS: SSW 10-15 |
| WEATHER: Sunny and hot...upper 90s by rides end | TERRAIN: Rolling to hilly | TOTAL CLIMBING: 2950 feet |
DAILY DOINGS: I think
everyone is ready to have a day off...but we've got to ride another day to St
Joe to get one...no problem. After a hearty breakfast at the motel, we got
an early start to beat the traffic out of Topeka. We ride right into downtown
and pick up highway 24 to highway 4. The final miles out of Kansas are pretty
tame with several long rollers to break the monotony. In Atchison we leave
Kansas and enter Missouri crossing the Emelia Earhart Memorial Bridge over the
Missouri River. After about 3 miles of rather tame Missouri flood plain riding,
we get into the real Missouri hill country. We take county road HH through some
beautiful rolling farm country to a little town of DeKalb (population 225) where
we had our second SAG at the town square. The final assault on St Joe was
rolling farmland with mostly corn that's taller than any we've seen so far.
Yes,
we entered our 5th state...Missouri. After the riding in Kansas we've had
this year, I'm almost sad to see Kansas go by. We've had pretty good
weather all through the state and the winds have been really on the friendly
side too. Today was no exception as we had tailwinds most of the day and
the breezes kept the riders from overheating as the temperatures rose into the
90s again. Now that we are getting into Missouri, we'll start to see more
strenuous terrain like that right, but it will be beautiful as we trek through
the "Show Me State."
I gave everyone the option
to ride a more direct route into town or to ride the hillier more scenic route
out in the country. All but a couple chose to ride the hilly route and
even though it was a bit tougher and a bit longer, everyone that chose that
option enjoyed the rolling terrain and the scenic landscape. This is one
of my favorite days to ride but I was happy today to get plenty of photos of
riders riding up and down the Missouri rollers. I them today was a good
practice for the next few days as our terrain will be similar until we get to
Illinois. There were several areas today that looked like someone had
gotten hold of one end of the road and flopped it like a rug to make lots of
bumps...there were times we could see 10 or 13 hill tops in front of us as we
would start down the one we were on...like a roller coaster to say the least.
Everyone was in by about 1:30
and settled in by 2:00. We had rap for Tuesday and introduced our new
rider Mike Grzywacz
who will be riding with us to Indianapolis...welcome Mike. After rap and
dinner, I spent a couple hours replacing chains for several riders...it's about
that time since we've been over 2000 miles so far.
We'll be off tomorrow...think we'll take in a movie and I'll try to get my camera fixed. I'm thinking it's past fixing, but we'll see what they say. Meanwhile, I'm using Karen's camera...it takes some pretty good shots too don't you think? Hope you'll join us when we continue on the 4th...maybe we'll run into some parades along the way. See you on Tuesday. M
| DAILY DISCERNING DIALOGUE: "It would be a lot easier if I had over 100 pounds of air in my tires." That light bulb blinded someone. "This is the best butt day I've had in two
weeks." "Missouri sure isn't flat." "Where was I when you needed me?" Clarence when he heard I needed material for the website. "I'm not a morning person...lately, I'm not a mid-day person either." "What a roller coaster ride." |
DAILY DUH: Linda and Jeff were riding out of town together and Jeff was leading...Linda was following along and checking him on her route sheet. "Hmmmm, this doesn't seem right," she thought. "These cues seem familiar...oh yeah, Mike briefed us last night. That's why I recognize them." It wasn't until they were about 12 miles out of town that she figured out her route sheet didn't match were Jeff was taking her at all...then she noticed the heading read "Abilene to Topeka." It must be groundhog's day. She had yesterday's route sheet. |
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DAILY DIGITAL DELIGHTS |
|
 Whoa big fella...we'll be on the road soon enough. Larry could hardly hold his steed back this morning. |
 Are there directions with this waffle machine? This thing looks like someone's already chewed it. |
 Nice repair job on that waffle Scott. |
 Alan, we didn't know you could cook...nice job on those donuts! |
 Anytime bags are on wheels, you can't be too careful...always wear a helmet lest you be thrown. |
 Linda and Jeff made it to the second SAG in spite of Linda using yesterday's cue sheet. Good thing they made it...they got to meet Ryan in DeKalb...a local young man interested in what we were doing on this holiday weekend. |
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