Day 33 -- Kirksville, MO to Quincy, IL

Miles: 100.47
Total Miles: 2436.72
Time: 6:28
Average Speed: 15.5 mph
Max Speed: 39.9 mph
Flats Today: 0
Total Flats: 13
Elevation Gain: 3431 ft
Weather: Low winds around 90 degrees and humid
Today we crossed the Mississippi River and went into Illinois. It was rolling hills all the way to the river, then flat after the river. Yesterday we learned that the river was flooded and that the ferry wasn't going to work, so we would have to sag across a really busy bridge instead. It wasn't much of a surprise since the Mississippi River usually floods around this time each year, but that really bumbed us out last night. We woke up at 5:30, ate breakfast at 6:00, loaded at 7:00, then got onto the rolling hills of Missouri again. We were the very last people to leave this morning because they let the slower people go out early and Fran was moving slow. We had to play catch-up for the first 25 miles through the hills all the way to the first sag stop, but it wasn't bad. I stuck on Wade's wheel to get a little draft, and we actually ended up catching a lot of people. I used what, Rand, one of the riders, calls "son power" to get me to the sag. The true Tony Chasing Wade. We stayed awhile at the sag stop, which resulted in us being almost last again. By the way, at the sag stop they told us that the ferry reopened, but it was moved to a new location. That really got our spirits up for a second... Then we hit more hills. We caught back up with people after the sag stop, then we got far enough ahead that we decided to stop at Primo Subs to eat lunch. The subs were decent, but the ice cream was magnificent and really cheap. They had a bunch of flavors, so we ate ice cream before and after we had our sub.

After lunch, we went about a half of a mile to the next sag, but we didn't even stay a minute because we saw the ferry and didn't want to wait for the next one. We got on the ferry with about 7 other riders and one of the sag vans. We took a large amount of pictures on the ferry so we could capture as much of the Mississippi River as possible. Like I said earlier, it was flooded, so the river was extremely high and wide, and the ferry was in a new location. When we got off of the ferry, it was like a whole new state... because it was. We were in Illinois, but there was no sign, so we have to wait until we hit the Indiana sign, then turn around and take a picture of the Illinois sign. Anyway, we could tell that we were in a new state because the rolling hills were gone and it was flat. It was like Kansas all over again except less wind, less cattle, and better scenery.

We rode with a slight side wind for awhile, then we turned and the slight side wind turned into a slight tail wind. It was nice to just cruise behind Wade at about 20 mph without putting out much effort at all. We rode across and along some levies that were actually needed at that time. The water was really high, but we didn't even know what high water was until we got about 5 miles out from Quincy. We came up to a branch of the Mississippi River, and it was flooded. There were houses that had stilts, and their driveways were completely flooded over by water. They had tents outside that were almost completely under water. They had boats lined up so that they could ride from their house to the road. It was unbelievable how flooded it was. Anyway, we took a few pictures, then continued along the side of the Mississippi River.

We knew that we were going to be a few miles short of a century, so we decided to take a little detour. We went across a small bridge that went over the branch of the Mississippi, which resulted in us being in a park on an island between the real Mississippi River and the branch. We talked to some guy and he told us that there was a trail that went out to the edge of the real river, so we decided to take that. It was very narrow, so we eventually sat our bike down and walked through the trail. The trail came out to a bunch of trees that were completely under water. When we got there, we could see the Mississippi, but only a little bit because we couldn't see very well past the flooded trees. We went back through the trail and got on our bikes again. We rode a little bit further through the park to get some extra miles, then we moved on.

Next, we came up to a river scape where we had some great views of where the branch reached the real river and the two large bridges that crossed into Quincy. At one point Wade reached down and put his hand in the water, so I made him hold it there so that I could take a picture. He even stepped out onto some posts in the water... don't worry Joan, he's a lifeguard, so I wouldn't have to risk my dear sweet life to save him. Anyway, we got some more pictures of the bridges and Mississippi River, then we finished out the ride.

When we got to the hotel we were about a half of a mile off of a century, so we rode past the hotel and looked for a grocery store. If you didn't guess by now, we bought a few pounds of cherries. We brought them back, and on the way back, we got to 100 miles for the day. Once we finished most of the cherries, we got in the pool. At least tomorrow we won't have to do extra miles to get to a century... it's already 106 miles the way it is.