Cyclists Rule: May 18, 2009

Monday, May 18, 2009

Louisiana, MO to Quincy, IL

55 miles. It was a beautiful day most of the ride today was great - we were on little used farm-to-market roads along the Mississippi River. There were farms all along the way but for the most part we did not see any indication that actual farming activity was going on: most of the acreage looked empty for reasons we could not figure out. However, an approximately 20 mile section of the road from Louisiana to Hannibal (Hwy 79) contained several killer hills, as the sadistic highway engineer who designed it decided it would be great if the road periodically rose nearly straight up to the towering river bluffs (so tourists could get better pictures, no doubt) then plunged back down to the bottom land. Two of these climbs were so steep that we had to get off and push the tandem for at least a quarter of a mile before the grade eased up enough to enable us to ride. We managed to get through it OK but we were glad to find that the last 20 miles (Hannibal to Quincy) was generally flat.

Quincy is a town of about 40,000 people on the Illinois side of the river. There is a small college here (Quincy University) and many, many lovely old homes. This is easily the largest town we have been in since we left Pueblo, CO on the second day of our trip. Most importantly, they have a decent bike shop where we were able to buy another safety flag (thanks for the concern and offer to help on this, John), another tire to use as a spare and some more tubes. This stuff sounds routine, but the tire/tube sizes, types and pressure ratings are specialized and thus not found at your local Wal-Mart. Tomorrow we head to Nauvoo and a rest day on Wednesday. Yahoo for Nauvoo!