Notes From The Common Man: June 3rd update

I left Carbondale on Friday morning after having some repairs to my bike on Thursday. I'm riding alone now that Malcolm and Ian went on ahead in Carbondale. I will miss them, but it's nice to ride at my on pace.

Soon after going through Murphysboro, I entered the Mississippi levee area. The terrain was flat and flooded with no services from Murphysboro to Chester except for a post office. The fields were slowly drying out after the spring floods, but a lot of them looked like calm shallow lakes with corn growing right down to the waterline and houses sitting on little islands with driveways barely above water connecting them to the road. I actually had to ride through one section of road that was flooded but only about four inches deep.

Part of the ride was atop the levees where I had a really good view of the land between the levers and the bluffs way off in the distance. At one point there was a gigantic coal loading operation where they unloaded freight cars and conveyed the coal over to the river to be loaded on barges. I could see a long distance from the levee but the line of coal cars stretched completely out of sight. All the cars were connected and there was a locomotive on a separate short track that would work back and forth grabbing the next car from the side and pulling the entire train of cars forward one car lengthy at a time. Then a big machine would grab the car and rotate it sideways 180 degrees to dump the coal. The coal was then conveyed to coal mountain where a huge machine on a long arm with rotating buckets dig the coal and load it on to a conveyor to the barges. I know this is a long boring explanation, but I was really fascinated by the whole operation. On down the road, just outside Chester, there was an operation where they were loading coal from barges to trucks. Fear, not fascination, was the operative word here. A huge coal truck passed by me every minute for the last five miles of my ride. Nothing makes my butt pucker up like a tractor trailer roaring past me when I'm doing 5 mph and it is doing sixty.

I stayed at the Eagles lodge in Chester last night. I guess that's the equivalent of a Moose lodge or a VFW. They have a hostel there for riders with shower and bunks, or you can pitch a tent. I opted to pitch a tent in the volleyball pavilion. It was covered so I just pitched it without the rainfly. Fortunately it was not volleyball league night.

At the Eagles lodge a had several good conversations with the locals, but my best encounter was with the lady Barbour who had her shop in a converted railway car that she and here husband had made to look like a caboose. It was very well done, inside and out, with one antique Barbour's chair and no customers while I was there. I spent about an hour and a half talking to her. I think I got most of her life story. Her name was Sandy, she'd been a Barbour there for about 25 years, slightly younger than me and on her second marriage. I got the impression that she was slightly suspicious of strangers, but she sure opened up to me. Who knew I could be so charming.

Today I left Chester at daylight and crossed the Mississippi on the old steel bridge below the city. I had been dreading Missouri, because of the hills and poverty (I guess I should not have watched Winters Bone) a few nights ago. ). The hills were rough once I got out of the flood plain, but the terrain was really beautiful. I guess I should vary my superlatives a little more, but I can't think of a better one to describe the landscape. The land was dotted with Upland farms and pastures with low mountains off in the distance. After every climb I was rewarded with an amazing Vista for my effort.

Here's a video of me going down a big hill in Missiouri, filming with one hand on the I-phone. Listen carefully and you will hear me grunt when I hit a big bump near the bottom.

I rode into Farmington around Eleven o'clock this morning and I'm staying at Al's hostel which is an old jail converted into a bike hostel. It is super nice with bunks, shower, tv, internet, linens, and ac. By biking standards it is a palace. It's supposed to be the best volunteer lodging on the entire trip. The ACA supported group is staying here as well, and they have invited me to dinner.Life is good. There was a big "farming days" festival going on in Farmington that afternoon. I caught up on my beer, junk food, and country music.