August 3, 2023
Road Closed: HA! NOT!
Kankakee is a pretty spread out town. Took me eight miles to leave it. Lots is railroad tracks in town. Not sure which line the “City of New Orleans” ran on and I bet many of the tracks back in those days are long gone.
No trails today, only roads. Instead of following my 2021 route I let google do the planning. It was a nice ride. Even took me through a Fish and Wildlife Preserve that had the best roadway I have been on since leaving Seattle June 1. At one point west of Rensellaer google wanted me to go on a road just south of the one I took. I chose to ignore it as I had been on that one before and had a ton of garbage trucks bringing garbage from Chicago to one of the largest landfills I’ve ever seen. So I stayed on my route to avoid the trucks. However at one point I encountered a Road Closed sign……so I ignored that too.
Seems they were tearing out blacktop to a depth of about six inches and laying concrete in its place. I jumped on the side that had been removed and rode for several miles car free. One supervisor in a pick up told me to turn around but I ignored him too. A guy in a concrete mixer said I had balls riding on a closed road. But when I got to where the actual construction was taking place several guys directed me through. One guy was so excited when I told him I was riding Seattle to Maryland, he ran around my bike several times showing his buddy all the stuff I was carrying. He couldn’t believe what I was doing. He was a bit hyper so maybe he had too much coffee….or sun…..or something else! When the construction was over and the road opened up I ran into…….all the Chicago garbage trucks I was trying to avoid. Seems they changed the entrance to the dump. Who knew?!?!?
Oh, and I crossed into Indiana today. State number nine. Four more to go! Indiana is sort of like Iowa……lots of corn and beans, some cattle, and a few horses. It is however flatter than Iowa, at least for now. And there are more trees. Tomorrow I am shooting for Rochester Indiana, but I’ll decide in the morning.
Today's ride: 57 miles (92 km)
Total: 2,765 miles (4,450 km)
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