Day1: Louisville to Mitchell IN

Saturday June 8, 2019

Oy, my aching legs. Today I had to completely re-route twice and both reroutes greatly increased the climbing and, to a lesser extent, the distance I had to ride. On the other hand, the second reroute also made my ride more peaceful and generally - except for the hill i could barely push my bike up - better.

My ride today started at the KY end of a new - in the last few years - bike/ped bridge over the Ohio. I left my helmet at the start - my wife texted me to come back and get it - and I had some annoying problems with my front tire rubbing on the fender under the fork. That one was hard to deal with until I realize that I could fix it by cocking the axle a little in the fork dropouts. That is not a good permanent solution, but it worked fine for today.

The path across the river is about 3 miles long and VERY nice. I left it on a road that goes over the new Toll Bridge road and then I was supposed to turn left on a road that was closed by a barrier. I made the next left turn, but that left me of-route with my Gmaps app unable to reroute me. This is not an area with plentiful road options. I tried a couple of things and finally settled on what looked like my best option. The road was, on my OSM map, a nice straight line to a much shorter road that ended at US-31 near a place where 31 came very near I-65 and connected to another road that went under I-65 and then made a short and direct connection to IN 60 in Hamburg, on the other side of the interstate.

Actually, the first road, The Salem - Noble Rd - was not at all straight because it crossed a lot of ridges. By the time I got to where it ended, I had very tired legs. The next road went into Sellersburg with a whole lot of construction, but I-31 did get to the road under I-65 and to within half a mile of IN-60.

I stopped at a McDs on the other side for coffee and oatmeal. That Mcds wifi would only connect me to the login screen for employees and the, very nice, kid that I ordered from could not find anybody there who had a clue about how to resolve that problem. No big deal. I was less than half a mile from IN-60 and it was my route for the rest of the day. Charlestown Rd was the road to IN-60. It was closed except for local traffic!

Gmaps had routed me on that closed road so I figured maybe I could get past the blockage. I rode down to and looked. Even bushwacking through massive vegetation in yards on either end of the 30 foot wide, 10 foot deep, 50+ foot long, gully that had replaced that part of the road on foot didn't look do able. I could almost see IN-60 on the other side, but I couldn't get there. There was a an detour sign near the barrier, but it looked like the detour used I-65 so that wasn't promising. I headed back the way I had come and, when I was stopped at the head of a queu waiting to go back up IN-31, I had a very good conversation with the flag man.

I told him I wanted to ride to Salem. He said "You've got a very long detourto get there." I asked about going north on 31 instead and getting to Salem on In-160. He, eventually, agreed that was probably my best option. US-31 is a great bicycle road and, today, riding it, I even had a tail wind.

It was very nice riding! At Memphis, IN I discovered a small road that, after going through a major I-65 intersection, went on through the town of Blue Lick and ended at New Liberty on IN-160. That road would save me a few miles and give me some very peaceful riding. It also would, a bit over a mile from IN-160, challenge me with the hardest hill I have ever pushed a loaded bike up!

After a 15 minute rest/recover/snack break at the top of that hill, I rode on to IN 160. Nice riding, very light traffic, no shoulder but no problem. Then it got hilly - more of those ridges - and I reached Bunker Hill. That hill, on my already very tired legs, was just climbable in mt lowest granny gear - 15". then there were series of ridges that got easier and, finally 160 was back to moderately hilly. I made it into Salem and stopped at a Wendys for a very late lunch.

Lunch really helped, so I rode on through Salem - neat old town center - and past the nice looking Knights Inn that was my first possible stopping place. It was about 20 miles, to the next place and Gmaps said it was basically gentle down hill. That wasn't quite true, gently rolling was a better description, but it was much easier riding on IN 60. The wind, which was a cross/head wind slowed me down, but kept also me cool. My abused legs kept treatening to cramp, but that eased up towards the end of my ride.

The second motel where I hoped to stay was not open, so I had to ride on to Mitchell. My ride distance was 70 miles when I got here. My third motel option was open, but no one came when I went in the office. I went next door to MCds, ordered supper and called the motel. I did get an answer and, after supper, I got got a room for $63 just before 7 PM.

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