Day 17

Mileage: 76
Total mileage: 1352

Back on the road with a short day today.

This morning I got to sleep in, but I was waiting outside the Farmington bike shop when they opened at 10. They didn't have a new chainring in the size I needed, but they did have a relatively lightly used set they pulled off a bike someone else had traded in. It wasn't perfect, but as the shop owner aptly pointed out, it was a lot better than what was currently on my bike.

 

After letting them fiddle around with it for a bit I was back on and ready to go. I'm convinced that cyclists on the trail get special pricing because the whole deal with derailleur adjustment came out to 25 dollars, parts included. By noon I was ready to go.

 

The only issue is that I was going backwards, not forwards. I want to make sure I finish this whole trail and don't skip any part of it, including those last 7 or 8 miles I hitchhiked last night. So I set off eastward got to the highway I would be riding and tried for about 20 minutes to thumb a ride back to my spot. I must have looked sweaty, scary or both because I couldn't convince any pickup trucks to pull over and let me hop in the bed. I could have used my nonthreatening hitchhiking buddy Hannah in this case, but she was at least a thousand miles away and not readily available.

 

Finally, like a petulant toddler being sent to his room, I sulked those 8 miles back through the heat of the afternoon across the steep rises and descents, back to the place I broke down yesterday. I even rode halfway up the next hill, just to make really freaking sure I didn't miss any ground after riding all the way back.

 

While the slog out to my breaking point took an eternity, the return trip was relatively quick and easy. It's completely a mental thing and today was mentally rather frustrating. By the time I was back in town, had lunch and was ready to make some actual progress, it was close to 3 in the afternoon. That was one of the low points in my trip, sitting hot and sweaty in an all you can eat pizza cafe, stuffed and bloated because I tried to eat a trail sized meal after a low mileage morning and thinking to myself that I had made no headway yet today.

 

Fortunately, the answer to my dilemma was to put on some miles, and I'm getting really good at doing that. I pulled about 60 miles this afternoon through the Ozarks which are admittedly hilly, but nothing near what I've come through so far. Seriously, I've no idea why everyone complains about the Missouri hills, it's gorgeous and fairly easy riding.

 

The scenery is completely changed from yesterday's corn fields and rivers. Today, even though I'm not even at 2000ft elevation, I'm riding through alternating conifer stands and meadows. The one picture I included today is of some pretty typical scenery from this afternoon.

 

Along with the change in scenery has come a change in the type of roadkill I'm seeing. Go ahead and take a guess what's been the most common animal by the side of the road these last two days. Wrong, it's armadillos. I've never seen a live armadillo outside of a zoo, but I've seen about 3 dozen dead ones now, which I think is close enough.

 

One thing I've noticed is that I have a very good sense for distance, it's just miscalibrated by about 400 yards. I check my maps every 20 miles or so, meaning I have a decent idea of how far I'm going on a road before I should see a landmark or make a turn. Many, many times this trip I've stopped to recheck my maps because I felt I should be at my destination/turn and was worried I'd gotten off route, only to get back on the bike and see my landmark around the next corner. I've gotten so consistent at doing this that I've found my off-route anxiety to be a great predictor of when I'm about to arrive somewhere. Sure enough, this evening I started to get anxious that I had missed the turn into Ellington which immediately made me excited, knowing that I was probably getting close. Less than a quarter mile later I rolled around a corner to see the sign marking Ellington city limits. Hopefully that anxiety-excitement association doesn't turn into anything pathological...

 

I rolled into Ellington (pop 987) this evening, making about 60 miles of actual progress, which felt really good considering today's circumstances. There's a TransAm hostel in town, so I took a shower before going back to watch a little league baseball game I saw on the way into town. I met a nice couple who live right across the street from the hostel and we chatted for a while before I went to grab Mexican food for dinner.

 

The hostel is full of cyclists tonight so I'm sleeping outside under a pavilion with two other cyclists, Mike and Stewart. When I got back from dinner, Mike informed me that the lady from the baseball game had stopped by with ice water and a milkshake for me. He needn't have mentioned it though because he also told me they were both delicious as he had saved them from melting while I was gone.

 

Getting to bed late, but the heat hasn't been to bad. I can get up tomorrow at 7 and comfortably ride through the day. Hopefully. Fingers crossed. G'night!