Today was going to be a short ride. Mainly it was due to the spacing of towns
with available camping/hoteling opportunities, but I was more than ready for a
nice, easy day. Because of this I made
the mistake of sleeping in an extra hour, then trundling into town to do a
desperately needed load of laundry.
While my filthy cloths were being transformed by soap, water, and a
vigorous spin cycle, I found a breakfast place nearby. Despite the little diner being all but empty,
it took about twenty minutes for them to make me a western omelet! Could it have been that I was wearing rain
pants and my bright yellow rain jacket on a bright and sunny day?
It was 11:00 by the time I got my clothes dried, broke camp,
and got on the road...just in time for the hottest part of the day. What should have been a short, leisurely ride
turned into a grueling fight against the heat and hills. Partway up a particularly daunting incline, a
guy pulled up behind me. What the heck
does this freak want? I backed up as he
rolled down his window and held out two bottles of cold water. I didn’t really need the water, but I accepted
them with expressions of joy and gratitude.
He talked about how he used to cycle when he was younger,
and told me I had about 6 miles to go before I hit the next town. When he drove away he went the opposite way
that I was going, which meant that he passed me, then went out of his wat to
turn around just to help me out. Once
again, people can be frickin’ awesome. (By
the way, the next town was, indeed, exactly 6 miles away.)
When I got to the little town of Winterset, I went to the Super
8 hotel. With more storms on the way, I
wanted to be indoors for the night. I
was surprised to find out they only had one room available – a smoking
suite. Blech and double blech. There was a new place down the road, the
Cobblestone Inn, so I rode down there to see if they had a non-smoking
room. Nope. They were fully booked!
I knew it was a Friday night, but how can these two hotels
in the back end of nowhere both be full?
On the ride back to Super 8, I learned two important facts about
Winterset. First, it was in Madison
County – yes, that Madison County, the one with the bridges. It was also the birthplace of John
Wayne. It would be difficult to design a
more perfect old folks magnet than that!
When I got back to Super 8, the bad news was that the
smoking suite had been taken. The good
news was that a cancellation had come in for a non-smoking king room, which is what
I wanted in the first place. Awesome
sauce! After a chicken sandwich from
Hardee’s and a couple Sam Adam’s Summer Ales, my day was complete.
What I Learned: Get started as early as possible when it’s
going to be a hot day, and make sure the sleepy little town you’re planning to
stop at isn’t an AARP tourist hot-spot before you decide you don’t need to make
a room reservation.
Distance Today: 27 miles
Total Distance: 1,642 miles
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