Day 21: Resting out of the Storm

Holed up in St Louis, the weather has been 25mph+ winds, rain, snow, sleet, and a temperature hovering around freezing. 

Taking today off and catching up on email and other things. Taking tomorrow off and touring St Louis.

Monday the weather supposed to warm up and I’ll get back on the road towards New Orleans.

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Day 20: Frosty

Left Subway last night and Beth, the owner, handed me a bag of cookies; had one for breakfast this morning.

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Woke at 6am, Erik (view his website) started the coffee and breakfast… I rolled over and moaned a few times.  Everything was damp and frosted.

I’d tried stuffing newspaper in my shoes last night to dry them out, but it didn’t help much.

After breakfast of cous cous, onion, carrots,and scrambled eggs, I packed up and headed back to the laundromat to dry my shoes and warm my hands and feet.

I’m sure I’ve damaged the adhesive on my shoes, but I can reseal them and it was worth removing some of the dampness and all of the cold.

We’ve been passing quilt prints painted or stuck to barns around here.  Barb told us that it’s a thing that people travel from around the country to see. They’re pretty neat looking.

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Heading to the Brussels free ferry across the Illinois River and then into St Louis to stay with a friend of a friend.

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Sunrise on the Illinois River

Day 19: Camping in the Illinois River Valley

Tonight we stopped into the Hardin Drive-In restaurant and asked if we could camp behind the restaurant if we ordered dinner. The employee called the boss and asked and they said yes; so we ordered a pizza for $12.75 and setup on the riverbank just downstream from the historic Hardin bridge. The southern most bridge on the Illinois River.

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We had a side wind or a tailwind all day, along with some big hills during our 55 mile ride. Erik topped out at 49mph (beating his earlier speed today of 44mph) coming down the ridge into Hardin at dusk.

Laundry is doing circles at the 24 hour laundromat. This post is being transmitted to the internet at the Hardin Subway.

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On to St Louis tomorrow …. 63 miles to go.