Well, we were hoping for some cooler weather to show up, but NOT. It's been in the mid 90's for the past week. Nope not the dry heat we had back in the west, that sweaty, humid heat that just keeps adding up through the day. Until about 3p when, you suddenly realize how hot it is. Especially when you go inside for a few minutes to eat or grocery shop. Ugh...... That's part of bike touring! We rode most of the day on a nice highway, with lots of shoulder. And we are starting to get into the Missouri hills. We rode across Missouri in 2013 when we cycled from OH - Boise, ID. Missouri hills are long and steep. On the tandem we generate a lot of speed going down the front side of the hill, but as soon as we start up it's like we hit a wall. With all of the bags on our bike, it catches the wind and just stops us. When we are riding without all of the baggage on the tandem, we can fly up these hills.
We realized as we rode that we still had our noise. So once again, we went through the "stand up, now stop pedaling, now pedal backwards, nope that's not it, ok now try taking your feet off....." Grrr..... The next bike shop was in Joplin, our next town.
We were in Kansas for a nano second before we reached Joplin. In Joplin we stopped at a bike shop so Hap could borrow a 14 mm socket and a ratchet as well as a pedal wrench. He took the REAR bottom bracket off. On the tandem we have two of those. I'm not saying anything......... He also tightened the pedals, cleaned everything up and put it all back together. The bike shop was called "The Blue's Bike Company". Really nice shop! After he fixed the bike we went next door grabbed something to eat, and rode on to Carthage.
In Carthage we stopped at another Brahm's Ice Cream shop for some great ice cream. Both of us were getting pretty hot. Temp on the bank said it was 97 degrees. I didn't really need a thermometer to tell me it was hot. We stopped at the grocery store for dinner supplies. I found some canned ham, instant mashed potatoes and peas. Sounds like dinner doesn't it? I've never had canned ham before. Getting to the little motel in town was tricky because there was a bridge out. It was easy to find, but the problem was that everyone else had to take the detour too! We were in a big parade.
We stayed at the Budget Inn, which ended up being a really nice little motel on Route 66. The owner was super nice, she said when I told her we were coming by bike, she put us in her biggest room. Dinner turned out to be really good! A little different for us, but at this point does it matter?
Carthage MO - Springfield MO
For today's ride we opted for the shorter version. Adventure Cycling had a fourteen mile add on that took us off of US Route 96 (which was actually Route 66). We opted for the shorter version on Route 96. It had alittle more traffic, but it also had a small shoulder. So it wasn't bad at all. We were glad we went that way. It was another 95 degree day with high humidy. We had some thunder boomers just before we started riding, but the rain had stopped and the sun was out. We hoped for cooler temps but not today.
We stopped at a convenience store for something to drink. There were a group of men sitting out front at a picnic table. So of course Hap had to say, "Are you guys solving all the problems today?" When I came out of the store Hap was sitting right in the middle of them, solving all the world's problems right along with them.
Not many services today, just one other convenience store besides the one we stopped at. We stopped
for a sandwich and some cheese. I don't know why but cheese sounded pretty good. Route 96 was not as hilly as the day before, but still had some rollers. As we got closer to Springfield traffic picked up. We didn't even stop for dinner supplies today, it was just too blamed hot. We found a hotel, turned on the AC and ordered a pizza! It has to cool off someday!
Springfield MO Day 2
We have been talking with the Springfield Pickleball club as we have been traveling. We found out that they usually play today at a place called The Courts here in Springfield. The bad news was that all of them were going to be at a tournament this weekend in New Mexico. So no one would be there. No matter. We decided to go anyway. So we played by ourselves, doing some pickleball drills for three hours in the morning and found a motel close by. Tomorrrow we have a decision to make. We
have reached the end of our Route 66 portion of our ride. Our plan was to head east on Adventure Cyclings Trans America route. But since we had ridden it before, we new that places to camp and lodging are hard to Come by. With all the hot weather and thunderstorms the next few days, we are considering going east on US Route 60 that has more options for camping/lodging. It also keeps us away from a section of the Trans Am that we considered to be unsafe back in 2013. Near Chester IL, the route has several miles on a truck route, that the trucks have claimed for their own. They didn't
like us the last time through there, so we are going to stay away from that area. We got ran off the road a couple of times and don't plan on a repeat.
We'll let ya know what we decide!
Oops!
Kansas - State number 6
Hello Missouri!
Joplin MO
Mmmm... good
Our last Route 66 sign
