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Day 32, Off route

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We left our motel room and had a hearty breakfast at the Garden Cafe in Eureka Kansas, where our waitress looked very much like my sister Kate. And, since I was constantly staring at her, I had to tell our waitress this, so that she didn’t think I was a weirdo. But, I’m pretty sure that she thought I was a weirdo anyway – I was wearing bike shorts at the time.

Our day was fairly uneventful, we had some busy roads and rough shoulders, but nothing extraordinary. I did see my first armadillo, but it was a little bit squished (roadkill). We also diverted from the official “trans America” trail. We decided back in Utah that we would rather cross Missouri using the Katy trail (a rails to trails bike path that traverses most of the state) than go through the Ozarks. The benefit to this is threefold, the Ozarks are notoriously steep and winding, with poor visibillity, small shoulders and heavy traffic. The Katy trail, on the other hand, looks very pretty, has no traffic, and is kept fairly flat, since it used to be a railroad line. Now that we are off route we are using a Kansas state map, but it doesn’t have any of the useful extra information that our other maps have, like service stops etc. So, we have to freewheel it a bit.

After 99 miles, we made it to Mound City. We were looking for a place to camp and scoped out the town park (no water), the Methodist church (no one home) and we were looking for the police station when a woman in a postal service car asked us if we needed help. We explained our search for a camp site and then she offered to let us camp in her yard. People in Kansas are the nicest. Chilesa and her husband Van live in a huge log house at the top of a hill, with a beautiful view, and, they have horses. The horses were very curious and they came over to check us out while we set up our tent. After we set up our tent, Chilesa offered to drive us into town to get dinner (even though it was only maybe 1/4 of a mile and we could have walked.) and she even came back to pick us up. After dinner we showered and spent the evening chatting with Chilesa an Van. One if the nicest parts of this trip so far has been the wonderful people that we have met. After the generosity and kindness of our hosts tonight, I am filled with all sorts of warm feelings. Thanks to Van and Chilesa.

Day 33, Not in Kansas anymore

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We woke to an extremely dewy morning in Mound City, it might as well have rained. Fall seems to be making an entrance in the Midwest. Today we were headed to Clinton MO the western end of the 225 mile Katy trail, 80 miles away.

This was also our second day off route using standard road maps instead of our special adventure cycling maps. Although we don’t have the advantage of all the additional service information our bike maps provide, it was kind of fun to strike out on our own, not knowing what to expect from the next town.

On our way we passed through the Mine Creek Battlefield and the Marais des Cygnes Massacre sites. Not getting as much attention as VA in civil war history, the Kansas-Missouri border area hosted some critical events of the period.

Even though today was a relatively easy 80 mile day, I was happy to get off my bike in Clinton, with an aching shin and ankle. We ended our evening by getting dinner at The Golden Corral buffet. If you’ve ever wondered why Americans have weight issues, make one visit to a Golden Corral and all questions will be answered. What is an all you can eat buffet’s worst enemy? A hungry cyclist.

Day 34, On the Katy

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We got a bit of a late start this morning. After taking advantage of the free continental breakfast, I decided it was time to swap my front and rear tires. My rear tire has completely warn down to the point that the hard layer of under belting has begun to show through. I guess that’s what 2300 miles will do, especially when it’s bearing most of my weight and a trailer full of gear. If we ever come across a decent bike shop I might look into getting a replacement, otherwise I’ll resort to using the spare I brought along for emergencies.

After a little wandering around in Clinton we found the trail head for the Katy Trail. It was pretty much as I expected, a 10-12 ft wide hard fine gravel packed path. At points cutting across open fields, other times carving a tunnel through the brush and forest. Best of all no cars, trucks, or RV’s to worry about. Also the grades are smoothed into very gradual climbs and descents as opposed to roller coastering. Perhaps the greatest challenge was the kamikazzi squirrels who constantly chose to dive in front of us at the very last moment. We also got surprised by the occasional black snake or turtle we had to dodge. I finally was able to secure the elusive peanut buster parfait at Dairy Queen which I had been searching for since Colorado.

The rougher surface does take a little additional energy to ride so the going is a little slower. We decided to make it a relatively short day and stop at Grove Point 68 miles total. We grabbed dinner at the bar/grill by the trail head and got permission to camp at the town park. Tomorrow we’re going to try and do a 100 plus miles, so we’ll be in easy striking distance of St Charles and the Mississipi on Sunday.

Day 35, Gimme Shelter

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Our planned early start this morning was delayed by rain. At 4:30am, we were forced to move our tent because of the rain. Luckily there was a covered picnic area, we spent the rest of the rain storm camped out there, and kept our stuff relatively dry. After the rain stopped, we had really lovely weather and Mike and I were enjoying our second day on the Katy trail. The scenery is beautiful, we have been following the Missouri River, and parts of the Lewis and Clark trail.

We had planned on a long day today, 103 miles to McKibben MO, but our rain delay and an extra long lunch put that goal out of reach. We settled on 78 miles to Tebbits, where we found a hostel to stay in. The Turner-Katy trail shelter is a two story building set up to give cyclists on the trail an inexpensive place to spend the night. It has about 20 bunk beds and a shower. Tonight we are sharing it with 3 other cyclists. The only drawback – there in nowhere in Tebbitts to buy food. So, we finally ate the cups of noodles that we bought in Middlegate, NV and the chili from Rico, CO. Tomorrow we will have to restock.

– Sarah

Day 36, Meet me in St. Louis

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We finally got the early start we were looking for in Tebbets. We wanted to finish up the Katy Trail today and had over 90 miles to ride over hard packed gravel. Since there was no resturaunt in Tebbets we had to cook our own breakfast.

There’s something to be said for getting an early start especially in the countryside. It was really beautiful and peaceful, though since the spiders on the trail had been busy building traps the night before we found ourselves constantly dodging, sometimes hitting the many webs stretched across the path.

We kept a steady pace throughout the day trying to make good mileage. The closer we got to our destination, the more bike traffic we found on the path, most not posessing our singular focus.

We crossed the Missouri River into the outskirts of St Louis a couple miles short of the end of the trail in the early evening. Eventually we meandered our way to a hotel still on the outskirts in Maryland Heights, total mileage 99.9 miles. Just down the street we were able to find a laundromat and a really good Indian resturaunt, in a strip mall. This was our first non Mexican, non burger, non steak dinner almost since the trip began. Tomorrow we work our way into downtown St Louis and start working our way South along the Mississippi.