Tuesday 22 June 2010

Marshfield to Ashgrove, (Missouri)

Today we arrived in a town called Ash Grove, Missouri after a very hot 50 mile ride preceeded by a very hot night camping at Marshfield city park (and also some drunken hollering from some locals and a train that honked and honked at about 2am). Luckily for us, we are staying in a small air conditioned cabin tonight at Ash Grove City Park - it means you get no sleep from all the snoring but I would much rather that than no sleep because you are being cooked alive in your tent!

This town is very pleasant and we have just spent the afternoon in the city park swimming pool, Robin reading his book in the shade and me trying to even out my tan - biking is not the best activity to do for a lovely even shade. I currently look as though I am wearing a pair of stockings and have strange markings on my back (due to the straps on my top). Generally my left side is darker than my right and my hands look like I'm wearing one of those Michael Jackson Gloves!

The route today was still hilly (actually 'hilly' does not do the Ozarks justice!) and I was exhausted after 10 miles let alone 50! However, it was very beautiful (as Robin kept pointing out as I am puffing up the hills!).

Tomorrow will see us crossing the border from Missouri into Kansas (our fifth state), how exciting! We are also half way through the entire trip tomorrow (days wise) so its definately feeling like theres no way back! We've been informed that most of Kansas is very flat, however, other passing cyclists we have met coming from the West complain about this as there is no relief from peddalling and there can be a horrendous headwind. Also, it will continue to be very hot and there is not much shade as Kansas mainly consists of corn and sunflower fields (or so I'm told). We also have to be on the look out for tornados (like in the 'Wizard of Oz'!) I think that cyclists are never happy! I am looking forward to seeing the famous fields of sunflowers and singing 'somewhere over the rainbow' as we pedal through and we will let you know what Kansas is really like in a couple of days! Our first stop in Kansas is Pittsburg where we will have a rest day so we'll update our blog then. Bye for now x

1 comment:

  1. Luc, if there's a horrendous headwind for those coming from the west, that'll be a nice tailwind wind for you eastern starters! And if you see a tornado and it doesn't look like it's moving then pedal fast - it's either coming directly for you or moving directly away from you! Hope you're both having fun.

    Dale

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