(Perryville, MO -> Murphysboro, IL)
Hi friends! This is Anna, radio’ing in from Murphysboro, Illinois! In this blog post, we bicycle over a large body of water (can you guess?), meet PopEye, and munch on (free!) egg sandwiches.
After a quick breakfast of eggs and pancakes, we said goodbye to Fraiser (our host), Nox (the dog), and Lumos and Gabriel (the kittens).
After only a few hills, we reached an incredibly flat valley. Within it, the Mississippi River flowed. And over it we cycled (on a very questionably paved bridge). On the other side, we encountered a policeman who kindly offered to give us a police escort across the skinny bridge - but sadly we had already fought our way across.
It felt like a very momentous day - we finally crossed the Mississippi River! We are really heading to the East Coast now. It also marked our 6th state border crossing of the trip! Hi, Illinois :)
Interestingly, the man who created PopEye (the cartoon, not the chicken place) is from Chester, Illinois (the town right on the Mississippi next to the bridge). So we saw his statue. I honestly don’t know anything about the cartoon (is that the guy that eats a lot of spinach??), so I was a lot less excited than everyone else.
We then cycled along the Mississippi towards Murphysburo, on a highway that was underwater only a few weeks ago because of the Mississippi flooding. We have had really good timing on this trip.
I roped Travis and Asia into biking directly to a coffee shop (instead of heading to our home for the night). It was lovely, if I may say so myself. The kind people at I Am Java even gifted us egg sandwiches and cinnamon rolls. Thank you :)
While I was relaxing with my coffee, the rest of the team found out that the place we wanted to camp was quite buggy and overgrown. So Sean found us a church to stay in tonight. He’s so good at convincing churches to let us sleep on their floor! It’s a good superpower to have.
I took a walk to a BBQ restaurant (17th Street) which was the 1990 world BBQ champion. I had a sweet potato and some Cole Slaw, because sometimes it is hard to be vegetarian. Side note: do you know what Murphy’s Law is? (pause for you to answer) Do you know what Cole’s Law is? (pause again) It’s thinly sliced cabbage in a white dressing ;)
A family offered to let us shower in their home, so we all shuttled our way over in an attempt to feel less sticky. They have 6 kids, all between the ages of 2 and 12!!
After showering, Cole cooked up a dinner and told us stories of his rambunctious youth (spoiler: a lot of cycling). Tomorrow, we’re off to Shawneetown, Illinois! DC, we’re coming for you!