Another sunny morning, the second in a row, but this one vastly more frosty than the previous. The biggest problem with frost is that all that water stays stuck to things- and then melts- so it’s difficult to dry things off, even if you whack as much ice off them as possible.
If you have any tips, I would love to hear them.
I got going through what I pretty quickly realized is chicken factory farm territory, complete with company-owned farms and hatcheries, which oddly have signs that say “work carefully, someone who loves you is expecting you home tonight.” I assumed until that point that a chicken hatchery is a place where baby chickens are hatched, but perhaps there is some dinosaur hatching at work here too? More flat lands meant more smooth and quick riding, and before too long I moved out of sad chicken territory and into tobacco, oil well, and power plant territory! Tobacco is a curious plant- it actually smells very nice when it’s hanging out to dry, a sweet and leafy smell, but burning it creates a smell somewhere between melting brakes and PVC fires that I don’t believe anyone actually enjoys. Truly, one of the marvels of organic chemistry.
Passing into yet another agricultural area, which I’ll call “The Corn Zone,” I found a tantalizing clue to a mystery that’s haunted me for years: the DeKalb corn sign that’s hanging in our basement. Where is it from? What does it mean? Who is DeKalb? Well, today I found one that’s very similar at the edge of a cornfield, leading me to surmise the DeKalb is a company that breeds varieties of corn for commercial growth. I don’t want to check that online, because it would ruin the mystery, but it sounds like a good hypothesis to me. (My previous hypothesis was that DeKalb was someone, a distant relative perhaps, who had run for some political office, and their campaign icon had been an ear of corn.)
Continuing onwards, I found (to my surprise) that I would be taking a ferry across the Ohio River into Illinois, and (to my very great surprise) it was free! Once over the border, I realized that although my goal for the day had been met, there was still plenty of sunlight, and I had already gone 92 miles… So I pushed onwards for the second century of the trip, making it to Elizabethtown, Illinois before making camp.
Checking the weather, tomorrow appears to be a better day than I had anticipated- rains falling mainly from 1000 until 1300, which should give me some time to do laundry (vastly necessary) and some reading before continuing onwards across Illinois and into Missouri.
Despite the excellent outcome, the day certainly had its ups and downs. It started out weird- on the banks of a river engorged by the recent rains, I had dreams (nightmares?) of the river sweeping me away as I slept. Although I was a considerably safe distance from any erosion, I think that being able to hear the bank wearing away may have prompted these particular dreams.
In addition, I found that most of the trees around here still have leaves on them- it’s like they don’t even know we’re in the middle of November! Warm weather bodes well for the next few weeks- as long as I can avoid the rain, camping should be easier and quicker, and I’ll be able to get more miles in as well.
A frosty (beautiful) morning in Booneville today. Got going pretty smoothly, and after getting lost just once (Kentucky, at this stage of the game, has stopped taking care of their route markers and distinguishing landmarks) I was making pretty good progress until I stopped for lunch just after passing JCHS Road. I assume that’s an acronym, but… It doesn’t really roll off the tongue. After lunch, I found myself in Big Hill, Kentucky, luckily rolling down the 2-mile 6% grade into a blissfully flat landscape as far as I could see.
Maybe because yesterday was Sunday, maybe because people like to stay inside here, or maybe because mountain spirits regularly transform people into dogs here- I’ve seen more dogs than humans for most of the last two days. Western Virginia/Eastern Kentucky has every kind of dog imaginable- big dogs, small dogs, huge dogs, tiny dogs, loud dogs, quiet dogs, dogs in cages, dogs on chains, dogs that follow you half a mile down the road, dogs that ignore you, dogs that come over and sit with you while you’re having lunch. I will now do my best Roger Williams impression to describe my encounters with some dogs, including liberally replacing “s” with “f”:
I can also see why there is so much coal mining here- coal literally falls out of the hillside onto the road. I took a break next to an intriguing looking cave, and upon venturing inside, found that it was an abandoned coal mine. “Sweet,” I thought, “this is both a fascinating geologic formation and a great way to die!” I grabbed a handful of semi-anthracite and headed out, before I could get lost, caved in, asphyxiate, get black lung, cause and explosion, or any of the other typical hazards of coal mining. I’d actually hoped to find fossils in the cave, and I suspect that there were a few if I’d taken the time to explore, but I’m happy to say that I avoided the temptation and returned to scanning for fossils as I biked- not very fruitful, but possibly safer nonetheless.
Continuing on, I stopped at H.C. Sparks’ grocery, where I found they’ve been keeping a logbook of every cyclist to pass by (and stop in) for the last 40 years. I didn’t take a picture of the store- it was great, half of it was grocery, half of it was a hardware store, and the last half was an “indoor yard sale”- but you will notice the Log Cabin Cathedral right across the street, a fascinating sight to behold as you eat peanut butter sandwiches.
Post sandwich break, high points included reaching 1,234 miles and breaking into song (1, 2, 3, 4, climbing hills, my legs are sore…) à la Feist, and seeing another very lovely sunset as I came into Booneville.
Notes from Monomoy 