Thursday, July 20 and Friday, July 21. Sedalia, MO to Clinton, MO, to Butler, MO.
Thursday.
I had a bad night on Wednesday night, probably due to heat stress. By the time 5:00am arrived, I had to tell Matthew that we were going to have to take a rest day in Sedalia. I hadn't had more than an hour of continuous sleep all night, and I certainly didn't want to get on the trail given the condition of my stomach. I delivered the news to Matthew and fell asleep, not waking up again until 7:30am.
By that time, I had recovered somewhat, and since the day's ride was only 40 miles, we decided to set out. We stopped at the depot in Sedalia which had been closed by the time we reached it on Wednesday, and toured the Katy museum, restored depot and gift shop. So we didn't set out on the trail until after 10:30am. There were 4 trailheads on today's ride, each less than 10 miles apart, giving us the opportunity to at least take a break in the shade about every hour. I hoped that the low mileage and frequent breaks would allow me to finish the day's ride.
The route on the trail today was as rolling as we had seen on the trail. Rail beds are generally very flat, because locomotives are unable to climb much more than a 5% grade. The route between Sedalia and Clinton traversed 2 rivers, and so there was a one-mile climb and descent before and after each of the two river crossings. The path between Sedalia and Clinton boasts the trail's highest point--another uphill and downhill for us. Because we were now in the Osage Plains, I wasn't expecting to have much shade, but there were stretches of moderate shade in between stretches of full exposure to the sun. I tried not to think about the heat, but because we had left so late, it was already hot. I would find out later that this was our hottest day, about 107 degrees. Even the breeze was hot, hot hot.
This final stretch of the trail is also it's newest. There's another stretch from Clinton to Machens that is being developed, and I read in the Sedalia paper that plans to connect the Katy to Kansas City are also in the works. The first leg, 7 miles from Sedalia to Green Ridge, was almost all downhill. Nice. After a stop at the trailhead, we set off on the second leg. from Green Ridge to Windsor. After another 8 miles of fast, somewhat shaded trail, we stopped at the Windsor trailhead for a snack, and refilled our ice and water at a nearby c-store. (Also a good opportunity to mingle with air-conditioning)
The leg from Windsor to Calhoun was only 7.5 miles, but we took the opportunity to stop at the trailhead and sit in the shade. The last leg of the trip, from Calhoun to Clinton, was only 9 miles, but we ran out of shade almost as soon as we left Calhoun. By the time we got to Clinton, I was exhausted. We sat for a few minutes in the shade, but the wind was so hot that we might as well have been sitting in a furnace. I insisted that we take a picture of ourselves at the end, proof that we'd done it. When I looked at the picture later, I realized just how beat up we both were. Neither of us could muster a smile for the finish!
We had a couple more miles to ride to the day's end, the Hampton Inn. We stashed our bikes and trailers in the hotel's conference room. In the dust that had collected on the top of my BOB trailer, I was able to write "Lincoln City or Bust". We collected the things we'd need in our room, and headed off for showers. Dinner was a short walk to the nearest eating establishment, an Applebee's. Sitting in the restaraunt, we noticed again how it feels like the South here. The accents have changed again in Missouri--we could have been eating at Applebee's in Lawrenceville, GA. It'll be interesting to see if Kansas will feel like a southern state.
We borrowed the hotel's laptop and I was able to upload some pictures, but the computer was so slow that I didn't get all of the trail pix uploaded. Matthew was surrounded by state maps again, developing a route that will get us from Clinton back to the Adventure Cycling TransAmerica route. It was after 10pm when we both finally turned out the lights. The forecast for Friday called for a 70% chance of thunderstorms, but the hotel staff told us it was pretty unlikely we'd see rain. The heat was forecasted to break with the storms moving in, though. We had planned only had a 40-mile ride for the day, but I would ride twice that--in the rain--if the heat dissipated.
Friday
Again the alarm went off at 5:00am, and again we ignored it until 8:00am. I looked out our window and saw that we'd have some light cloud cover. I could also see evidence of a good wind, which the weather channel clocked as NE 16mph. What? An actual tailwind? I couldn't imagine it.
We drifted out to the lobby for breakfast, and almost immediately were drawn into a conversation with a couple from Nebraska. Beth and Dean were travelling to Memphis to visit their son Adam, who is an avid cyclist. He's ridden the BRAN (Bike Ride Across Nebraska) since he was 13. In later years, Beth and Dean would drive along the route with him and his riding buddies, providing SAG support for the BRAN event. They clearly think that bicycling is good for you. They seemed to feel that the career choices of their son and his buddies--policemen, soldiers and FBI agents--was influenced by their early exposure to cycling.
As we sat talking, the big black thunder cloud that had appeared in the west blew through the area. Except for a brief period of high winds, we'd never have noticed. Not a drop of rain appeared, so we finished up breakfast and prepared to hit the road. Again, it was late morning before we left, but with such a short day ahead, I wasn't too concerned. I finally felt 100% again, and was really hoping that a drop in the temperature would give us a good cycling day.
We were amazed at the difference in temperature as we hit the road. It was in the 70's, almost 30 degrees difference from the day before. And the wind was indeed at our back, a cool breeze coming out of the NE. For the first 20 miles, we headed west, fairly blown along by the wind. We averaged over 14mph on rolling hills. The landscape here is still rural, and although we did see cornfields, there were more cattle than we'd seen in IN and IL. I caught the scent of some newly-baled hay, and was immediately transported back to my great-uncle Frank's farm in Salem, OR. I remember visiting there as a city kid, completely taken in by farm life. Frank raised cows, sheep and hogs, farmed acres and acres of some kind of grain, and also had an apple orchard. We kids terrorized the sheep, got sick on apples, fed the pigs and rode the hay wagon during our visits. The scent of the hay brought it all back again.
After the first 20 miles, we turned south for a while. The wind was now blowing across us, but it still felt heavenly. Riding a paved road after days of packed gravel was great--smooth and quiet. The crunching noise of the packed limestone had filled our ears for 4 days, and now it was gone. The roads we took--Rt 18, K and H--looked worse than they actually were. Except for a few rough spots, the ride was smooth. Dark patches of asphalt that would have ordinarily signalled a rough spot had been smoothed out by traffic and maybe even melted by the heat. But the best part of the ride today were the hills. Rolling hills from start to finish. Geared up to my highest speed, I sped down, trying to collect as much momentum as I could to make it back up the other side. Some hills I could ride back up to the top without much effort, on others I dropped down to some of my lowest gears. And there was no break in-between the hills. Really, it was like riding a roller coaster--down and up, down and up. There was little traffic on the roads, and those cars we did see gave us plenty of room. At one point, I was at the top of a hill and could see at least 3 more hills laid out in front of me. Since I was ahead of Matthew at that point, I really felt like I was in the front seat of a great roller coaster--about to make the first drop. These kind of roads are just plain fun.
As we got into Butler, our day's destination, we stopped to check on directions at a local grain store. The two guys we found inside were friendly and helpful about getting us out to "52 Highway", as they called it. I noticed that other local folks use the same phrasing, putting the number before the designation. It'll be interesting to see if we find that in Kansas, too.
Even though we had left late, the weather change, our low mileage and roller coaster roads combined to give us an easy day. The 41-mile trip had taken us just over 3 hours; I still had time for a nap after lunch. Tomorrow we head into Kansas; I hope to be able to post some pix later tonight. Tomorrow's stage of the Tour de France is likely to be pretty exciting, now that Floyd Landis has cycled his way back into contention. We'll be looking for a hotel, bar or speakeasy with an OLN connection in Fort Scott.
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