Day 13: July 2: Barry to Grafton Il: 80 miles

We woke up and unloaded our bikes from the Ice House Inn, loaded our camelbacks with ice and hit the road. Katie stopped at the post office to mail her 2nd post card to her grandparents.

Breakfast at the Barry cafe was decent; sadly we are already too far south to expect real cheese on an omelet. Laura didn't finish her huge pancakes.

The route today sent us towards St.Louis with the option of a few different ferries. It turned out that some were not functioning, which made our route planning easier.

Katie worked on her hand-off technique for track. Chuck lost his flag on a fast downhill, she stopped and brought it to him. The googley-eyed fish lives on.

The nearest hotel on our map was over 70 miles away, and I wasn't sure we could make it that far. We deided to just go as far as we could, and camp if need be.

A general store had fluids for consumption but an out of order restroom. I sat and talked to this fella for several minutes while the others hunted down a bathroom. He doesn't talk much, and occasionally passes gas. Katie was not impressed.

We stopped for lunch in a town called Pleasant hill. Chuck got a Pony Shoe. It is a piece of toast with burger, fries, and cheese on top. Taters had some bread pudding, but didn't like it.

Everyone keeps telling us that we are passing the last food, lodging, etc until the ferry. Each time, we discover they are wrong. If they tell us a place is open, it is closed. If they tell us it is closed, they are open. Also, nobody knows what road the roads are named, and nobody knows how many miles it is until the next town. At one point, we asked residents how many miles until Brussels. One person said 1-2 miles, the other said 10-15 miles. It was over 20.

Several people have suggested to us that there are no food options in any neighboring towns. Almost every town has had a grill, cafe, or grocier. One guy told us that their hotel burned down 6 years ago...so we routed ourselves in another direction and gave up on the lodging there. After a bit we saw 2 brand new signs for the place..........dang! We no longer ask local residents for directions.

The buzzards keep circling. What do they know about the road ahead?

We rode through some very low communities; some houses still had sand bags in the yards from last years flooding. It is surprising that these towns still exist at all; I can't imagine anyone building new here. Hamburg was a really pleasant area, though it sure seemed close to the water.

The road was flat, straight, and the blacktop was smooth. We covered the miles quickly. After 55 miles, after Hamburg, we hit a wall of hills however, and our average speeds plummeted. Many hills had sections with over 10% slopes....too much for Laura and Katie to ride up.

We had a nice dinner in Batchtown Katie ordered a chicken pony shoe. Interesting. If you order a Horse Shoe, it comes with twice the meat.

Our ride took us down a peninsula where the Illinois and Mississippi rivers finally meet. We eventually passed the last bridge, and so we were really hoping that the ferry was running. After almost 80 miles, we arrived at the brussels ferry, which would take us near Grafton where a hotel awaited us. This was our 2nd Ferry of the trip, and this one also took us north.....so it isn't cheating.

In Brussels Taters tried out the tiny jail.

After crossing the river towards grafton, a short bike trail ride took us to town. The locals got ticked quickly when we rode on the regular road to get to our hotel...but oh well.

13 cemetaries today. We arrived at dusk. A few rude motorists who were upset that we were not using the bike trail (we needed to find the hotel). Slurpies from the gas station, and bed.