For those with time to burn, read on. The day started out riding into thick fog. Ignoring my sense of self-preservation I decided to attempt an action shot while speeding down a hill in a crowd in the fog:
It ended without mishap. After an hour or so the fog burned off and it turned into a beatiful sunny day. We rolled into a couple little towns early but didn't feel the need to stop until we got to Milo, where I obviously had to have my picture made.
In Milo we ate some breakfast burritos and some cinammon rolls and met Josephine, who lived right on the main drag. She didn't seem too phased by the tens of thousands of bikers rolling past her front door, but I guess when you're 11 months old you just kind of take a lot of new things in stride.
From there it was a lot of pretty flat and straight riding, so Barney and I got back into our peloton mode and cranked for a while. We had to bump out of the draft though when we got to the Beekman's ice cream trailer, where I have stopped every day so far. We did a little mental math and realized that this little family operation will probably clear $100K in this week - I know I'm helping them get there.
Now for a new segment I hope to continue for the rest of the week: pictures of American Legion halls. Below are the ones in Milo and Chariton, where we ended our ride for the day:
Today was the second shortest day of the trip, and we rolled into Chariton shortly after noon and Debbie and Tina were there again with cold beers and snack food for us - I hope they fully understand the joy that they bring to our day. I then ate two ice cream cones (padding my stats) and we wandered around the town for a little bit. Here's a picture of a bike that we see a fair amount of on this trip, apparently called a tadpole recumbent. I need help from my (extensive, I'm sure) readership to brainstorm why pedalling one of these would be an inherent disadvantage compared to a normal bicycle. It could be a selection bias, as maybe people who are less athletic gravitate towards them, but I know that they are always going slower on the road.
This is an antique tractor that we found parked behind a building. Not sure exactly what era they would have used something like this, but one look at this thing and all its exposed gears and flywheels makes me think there must have been a lot of mangled limbs around that time.
This photo is going out to John Logsdon - it's the old train depot in Chariton, which at least for tonight was the most popular dining destination in town. Barney and I tried to go have the all-you-can-eat lasagna there, but when we saw the line wrapped around the building we thought better of it.
Here's a shot of our bikes holding each other up - Barney's is the white (good) one, and mine is the black (evil) one - I like to think that this picture is some kind of yin and yang biking thing.
And finally, the latest picture of my ice cream accounting. I wish there was some way to normalize, because the ice creams I get from Beekman's are at least a pint each, but I only get to count 1 mark for each one. At this point it's looking like my goal of eating my weight's worth is ambitious. My friend Laura in San Francisco pointed out that it could be a sloping asymptote kind of situation too, as that level of consumption would certainly increase my weight. I'm not giving up yet though.
One other note of interest - Barney and Bill and Debbie got their pictures in the Des Moines Register at the end of yesterday's ride. I was relaxing and drinking beer too, so feel like I was equally qualified to be in the picture, but apparently I'm just not as photogenic: That's about it for today - we're camping on the lawn of an elementary school and there's a bar next door doing some atrocious outdoor karaoke. We'll see how long they can keep this up.
Today's stats:
Miles today - 44.8
Average rolling speed - 16.2mph
Butt soreness, scale of 1 (sitting in one of those big satellite dish chairs that's filled with baby powder) to 10 (doing a cannonball off the high dive into a swimming pool filled with Texas Pete hot sauce) - 3
And to appease Mark - we left this morning at 7:34 and arrived here in Chariton at 12:08.
I hope the rest of you aren't having to listen to some drunk lady belt out Goodbye Earl by the Dixie Chicks,
-Charles Milo Horrell
More friction, more wind resistance, less leverage/body weight for pedaling power. Those are my guesses. You could probably compensate for all of them if you wore enough Livestrong bracelets.
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