Day 2

August 31, 2023

New Franklin - Portland

Two flat ties, a broken sadddle, and lots of time to give each other grief, as we continued slowly to the east. Being the good Boy Scout Paul is, he brought two spare tubes, but no patch kit. That meant on the next flat, he would be in a world of trouble. The second flat happened at the end of the day, with the town in sight, so he walked his bike to our camp site at Rivers Edge. We had just enough time to walk across the street to the local bar and grill and eat dinner, then return and set up our tents. Repairs would have to wait until morning.

Shortly after a gourmet breakfast in Rocheport (Meriwether’s), Joe’s saddle decided to fall apart. The entire nose of his Brooks B-17 broke off. It was time to break out the Gorilla Tape, and start wrapping. Not a great situation, but Joe always maintains his composure, which is good. He would have to ride it broken all the way to St. Charles on Day 4. Ouch!

Besides the mechanicals, we were saved from riding the highway with no shoulder, because of a temporary bridge built by the awesome Mo. Parks folks between Tebbetts and Mokane. It was just barely wide enough to fit wide handlebars through. Unfortunately, because it sprang up on us so fast, none of us got a decent photo of it. The best attempt had a finger over the lens.

Just after the temporary bridge, we considered stopping at Mokane and camping in the Lions Park. The Mokane World’s Fair was packed into the park, and would not have been conducive to sleep. Little would we know, Portland had a maniac hot rodder who decided to rev his engine until 2 am. Lovely.

All in all, it was a slow progress day, that ended up being our highest mileage day.