Day 22, Monday, May 12
The day began with overcast skies and ten miles due west on good pavement, most of it slightly downhill. As John remarked later on a similar stretch, in many ways it is the best riding. Once you get your heavily laden bike up to speed, it takes very little effort to keep it going. You just pick the gear that suits your cadence and spin your legs. Next thing you know you're ten miles closer to home.
It was another morning with a long ride before we would find coffee. We finally reached Ramsey with it's Casey's convenience store where we had another cup. We also picked up snacks at the Dollar General across the street because they are so much cheaper there.
The next few miles out of Ramsey were some of the finest riding we have had in Illinois. Our route wound along some true country roads that, at times, made me wonder if Garmin was lying to me.
But we always found our way back to a well-, paved county road.
We spent most of the day heading due west. The sky was lighter to the northwest than to the southwest. At times we could even see heavy rain far across the fields to the south, but we never got more than a few drops as we skirted around the north side of the rains.
After almost fifty miles we reached Coffeen. I had faint hopes of a diner, but, as expected, Casey's and Dollar General were our options. The store was next to a city park, so we took our lunch -- two slices and a Diet Coke for me -- to the pavilion with the picnic tables. We had a nice long break there.
We were feeling good and wanted to go farther, but the campground seventeen miles away had no tent sites. So we rode just five miles more to Indian Grove Campground, which has nice tent sites right on the lake.
As we sat at the table contemplating dinner, John presented me with a gift, which I mixed with some lime Gatorade. It was better than expected, but I'm sure my taste has degraded somewhat.
We did have to retreat to our tents for an hour or so as some heavy rain rolled through. But we were eventually able to cook dinner and once again were in our tents, for good, by 8:00 PM.
Comments
Post a Comment