Day 9: Attica, IN to West Lafayette, IN

June 24, 2012

(By Joy)

We were reluctant to get out of bed in the morning, especially since we knew we had a short day into West Lafayette, so we turned off the alarms and went back to sleep.

We finally roused ourselves, though, got packed up, and loaded our bottles with ice from the hotel. As we were getting ready to leave, Bertie asked if she could make us some snack packs of high-energy food. She said she'd been watching Dr. Oz and was feeling really good after following his eating plan, so she brought us two big ziploc bags full of nuts and dried fruit for the road. Wow! We really appreciated that. With the recent storm damage to the hotel, I'm sure the owners have been stressed, but they were so hospitable and welcoming to us. We'd definitely stop again and recommend the hotel to anyone passing through.

After a forgettable stop at the local McDonald's, we hit the road, on our way to a rest day in West Lafayette, where I'd lived while in grad school at Purdue. We had a mix of shade and sun on mostly flat and rolling roads with a surprising amount of traffic for Sunday morning, particularly in little Independence where there was practically a traffic jam of people going to various churches, but we saw a cute little park just off the road and stopped for some Gatorade and shade.

We passed some goats and tried to get them to come closer for pictures, but they didn't. We also saw a giant top-heavy looking RV go by us in the opposite direction, only to see it coming back toward us on a gravel road a couple of miles later, the guy following behind in another vehicle clearly unhappy with driving in circles. I thought they might stop and ask us for directions, but they didn't. Hopefully they got to where they were going eventually.

Roads got a bit busier as we neared Lafayette, but we detoured off busy River Road and came into town a different way I thought would be less busy, particularly on a Sunday, but church was out and people apparently had places to go, so we had more company on the road than we like.

We made it to Tammy and Michael's house, grateful for them opening their home to us even though they weren't there, but quickly left again to find Jeff a burrito at his favored Chipotle. His line of thought went something like this: If he hadn't learned about bicycle touring back in 2005, he wouldn't have met me and, therefore, wouldn't have been introduced to Chipotle. Since West Lafayette was the first place he'd had Chipotle, this was a homecoming of sorts for him, and he soon had the pleasure of the “burrito coma” that comes from eating one of these monstrosities.

We decided to walk around a bit, stopped in a coffee shop, and were surprised to find a couple of friends there. Namrata is defending her dissertation in less than a week and was working hard on final revisions, while April had stopped in to distract her for a bit. We ended up adding to the distraction, but it was nice to see them and chill out for a while before going back to our hosts' home and getting cleaned up. Jeff found himself attached to the couch, so while I went for dinner with old friends, he extracted himself from the grip of the couch and stared catching up on this journal. I brought him some dinner, and we crashed hard and slept soundly in what Jeff declared as the most luxurious accommodations of our trip.

Outside the Attica McDonald's where we had breakfast. The main attraction in the town appears to be an ATV park, "Badlands" that is located at the site of an old gravel pit.

I really, really, really like this place.

Today's ride: 29 miles (47 km)
Total: 405 miles (652 km)

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