This time I suckered my crazy friend, Karen Evely, into joining Owen and I on a Katy Trail adventure. Karen and I have a bit of cycling history to our friendship.
Way back in 1990, Ben was a wee-baby and I had just moved back to Ohio, as a single mom, to finish college. It was a necessary but unwanted move. I had left a tight knit, mountain bike crazed community with prime trail riding habitat in New Hampshire for pastoral, northeastern Ohio. How and where would I find a single friend? Boo hoo.
So...... it's late March and I am pulling Ben in the Burley Trailer back from a trip to a nearby town. When suddenly some crazed chick goes flying by me in her Toyota Tercel, blasting her horn and screeching off to the side of the rode about 100 yards in front of me. The short version of her story is that she recently landed in that neck of the woods (and was miserable about it) from Phoenix, AZ and could not believe someone else rode a bike pulling her kid. It just so happen that she lived right around the corner from me. Her name was Karen Evely.
We spent the next two years exploring every corner of our region by bike, dragging our kids behind. I recently came across a journal that detailed those years. Here is an excerpt:
6/11/90 Rode to Mespo. with Ben and Karen. 28 Round trip
6/12/90 To Troy. Hot. w/ Ben and Karen 18 R.T.
6/13/90 Burton to Chardon loop. 26 miles No Kids. Fast.
6/14/90 East Branch ride w/ Burley 15 mile. Alone.
6/15/90 Chagrin Falls with kids for lunch. 35 miles.
weekend: race, 3rd place expert. 3o miles.
(no idea what race this was)Man, did we have fun. It really was the best way to "do" single motherhood. Nowadays I am a veritable sloth by comparison.
Back to the Katy Trail tale. We took Amtrak approximately 90 miles beyond where Owen and I got off last time in Jefferson, Mo. The plan was to ride from Sedalia to Jefferson in 2 1/2 days. It was hot, mid 70s, and sunny when we packed for the trip and then boarded the train. Perfect riding weather.
We disembarked (de-trained?) at noon-ish and ducked inside a restaurant for lunch in order to avoid a passing rain shower. After a leisurely lunch during which the rain never arrived, we went outside to officially begin our trip. Surprise of all surprises, the temperature had plummeted 20 degrees and was to continue decreasing, with increasing wind, throughout the course of the afternoon. Inconceivable!
Luckily I had thrown in a pair of pants and gloves for Owen during the last minute of packing, upon Tony's suggestion. Karen and I were not so fortunate. We did have light tights and wind jackets at least.
We headed east that first day, riding until dark with a strong, cold wind mostly at our back. We arrived at the small town of Pine Grove with a digruntled eight year old and a big hunger. We took advantage of the only food option available, a small clean diner. The owner suggested we camp in the town park and we did. Our summer sleeping bags were little match for the 38 degrees it dropped to that night. Owen-the-furnace did not notice but Karen and Wendy certainly did.
The next morning we headed to the grocery store, the only thing open on Saturday morning, to purchase breakfast and ate it on a picnic table with Owen bundled up in his sleeping bag. I am happy to report that it got progressively warmer throughout the day, so hypothermia never had a chance to settle in.
That morning's section of trail was surrounded by, almost exclusively, rolling farmland that is in production. Corn seems to be king in this area. Monsanto's minions, to be sure. We passed through a couple of small, colourful towns. As we continuued through the afternoon our path began to align more closely with the Missouri River and we entered the bluffs portion of the trail. The bird sighting were numerous and varied. The landscape became increasingly more interesting the further east we got.
We had planned to ride 40 miles that day but our attention was permanently diverted after only 30 miles by the town of Rocheport and its vineyard restaurant and general store. Owen and I have come to know this town intimately during our time in Missouri. It is located right off route 70 and we stop and eat at Les Bourgeois Winery Bistro whenever we find ourselves driving on this section of the interstate. They serve a delicious homemade concord grape juice that is for purchase at $6/bottle. Since the food at the blufftop bistro is quite pricey, we decided to have a little snack there, for the view, and then go into town for dinner at the general store. This worked out well because there is live music with dinner every weekend at the store. We enjoyed a fantastic meal and entertainment that evening and only felt slightly guilty about cutting our day's mileage short. Owen felt no guilt; he was very supportive of the idea of not getting back on our bikes until the next day.
Our final day Owen made the command decision that he was in charge and we would have to be stopping more often to explore. That was okay until it started a non-stop drizzle that made us buckle down and ride. Tony would be meeting us at Shakespear Pizza in Columbia, MO so we would not have to wait around until the next day for a train back to St. Louis.
Once a month there is an assembly at Owen's school where the kids do some kind of performance related to what they are working on in school. Sometimes they play the recorders and violins, recite poetry with choreographed movement, sing or perform a short skit. Since they have had a guest Eurythmy http://eurythmy.org/abeurp1.htm instructor for the past few weeks the 2nd-4th grade showed us what they are learning. I brought my camera wanting to capture images for posterity but was shut down. Not before I got one angelic photo and a reprimand from the teacher.
On the way home we stopped by the Cahokia Indian Mounds. This is an historic sight, a World Heritage sight in fact, that contains the archaeological remnants of the most sophisticated prehistoric native civilization north of Mexico. This area was inhabited by the Cahokia Indians between A.D. 700-1400 and was populated by an estimated 20,000. This was North America's largest city until Philadelphia came along!
Mound top love
