Three Bagger

It is amazing what a difference a day makes. Yesterday I rode 75.4 miles with an average speed of 12.9 mph. I finished exhausted. Today I rode 76.1 at 16.3 mph. And while not ready to dance the night away, I was able to walk to the motel bar and order a beer, under my own power. Maybe the terrain had something to do with it. The roads, not the path to the motel bar.

There were three events today that I, and likely a few others too, would consider a big deal. The first was our completion (sans detours, thank you) of 2,000 miles. Ordinarily this would be a big year for me cycling wise, and yet, I am still not 2/3rds done with one lousy trip. So yeah, it’s kinda a big deal.

The other, and I think the biggest deal of the day was the crossing of the mighty Mississippi River. I should mention that ordinarily US-24 has one, two lane bridge east bound, and one west bound. The first several hundred yards of the east bound bridge is currently under the Mississippi River, rather than over it. Therefore they have two way traffic on the west bound side and we hugged the railing. Which, unfortunately we are getting used to. I will tell you that I was grinning all the way across, it is very cool to cross the Mississippi on a bike.

Since there are no signs facing west, on the west bound bridge, we had to detour over to the closed bridge to get photos. Which brings me to my last big deal.

We passed into our 8th state. The day went well. Tomorrow we take a big bite out of Illinois with a 104 mile stretch to Springfield. Thanks for riding along.