June 6, 2006
Day 27: Chester to St. Joe State Park (Farmington, MO area)
This morning's game was called "flick-a-spider" since all these granddaddy long legs had decided to perch on my tent and everything else. I was glad I'd put up the tent--sometimes I don't if I'm in a pavillion, but there'd been some critters about in the evening, so I'd gotten it out.
I packed up pretty quickly and headed off toward the Mississippi and state #4, but not before taking time to stop at the Popeye statue (the creator of Popeye was from Chester) and get directions from some travellers who'd gone before me.
I sprinted across the narrow bridge into Missouri, thankful for patient drivers but sorry I couldn't get some river pics from the bridge. Traffic wouldn't have been THAT patient.
I loved biking in the flat floodplain on this side of the river, too, but couldn't help but think about how deep the water would have been during the big 1993 flood that had affected me in Iowa, too.
After that, the climbs got hot and tedious, so I turned on the radio and started looking for a spot to cook an early lunch to get rid of some of the weight in my bag. Signs for "Crown Ridge" started to appear, so I pulled into the restaurant parking lot to find a shady spot and had just gotten some food out when the groundskeeper told me I was welcomed to use the gazebo a little ways off by the TIGER PEN!!! But they were renovating, so no rescued tigers were there to watch me eat my lunch (but they should be back in a few weeks for anyone following after me). Crown Ridge also sports a classy B&B and the restaurant had cloth napkins and waiters in white shirts and ties even for lunch on a Tuesday.
It's not on the maps, but it was a rare classy find just West of the intersection of P and B on map 112 if you'd like to stop. (please be considerate if you're here, though. I guess they had some sort of trouble with a group of cyclists not long ago and asked them to leave when they started chalking the sidewalk outside. I was treated respectfully, but it's definitely a place where well-off middle-aged couples dine and proper ladies do lunch in this area trying to become a midwest wine destination, so please be considerate of that).
NOTE: I later found out how rude the place had been to some of the ACA folks, some who normally would frequent such places and spend lots of money there without thinking twice about it. I don't like places that judge bikers based on their clothes and their consumption of copious amounts of water...or whatever they were basing their judgement on.
Just down the road I met Lance, a VA Tech IT professor doing part of the trail and struggling with the hills on his recumbent. He informed me that Johnson's Shut Ins campground was out of commission due to a tragic break in the reservoir during the winter (I feel like I should have known about this earlier!). And he told me he'd stayed in the first campground east of there and that it was creepy, and if it was creepy for a middle aged guy with a scruffy beard, it was definitely going to be creepy for me. And the campground just this side of that one was closed, so my plans for a long day were quickly headed to the toiled. But I was kind of relieved, too. I didn't really feel like an 80 mile day anyway.
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I had a hospitality contact on the east side of Farmington but decided to do a few more miles and hit the state park outside of town on the west side. The bike shop in town is closed Mondays and Tuesdays, but the library let me have an hour and a half to get caught up on everything before my nice evening ride to St. Joe.
The park was nearly deserted and well taken care of. For future riders, there is an off-road-vehicle (ATV) park there, so it's probably noisier during weekends, but there's an equestrian section of camping closer to Farmington that doesn't have ATVs and would be a better bet on weekends.
I talked to my mom a while and she told me my cat had gone crazy over the gloves I'd sent home since they smelled like me. At least she hasn't forgotten me, but it kind of made me sad, too. I'll have to keep sending her things that smell like me, I guess. She sent me a furball in my care package, too.
Today's ride: 58 miles (93 km)
Total: 1,310 miles (2,108 km)
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