Day 03 - Evansville, IN to Columbia, MO

Today we rode to Mid-MO, what the locals call Middle Missouri. We slept well last night and got out the door after breakfast at 8:40am. A man was talking to Rob outside about the bike when Michele walked down. The man looked at her and said, "Oh she's small, you probably don't feel her on the back." What a flatterer! He was staying at the hotel while his 18-wheeler was getting repaired across the street. He rides a Harley and mentioned the Sturgis Rally that is going on now in South Dakota. The Canadian man who talked to us yesterday came outside to check his rental car. He said it had a flat tire yesterday. He asked about our trailer, if Rob notices it while riding (no, only when braking). 

We got on the road and the skies were heavy with fog. Once moving at highway speed we noticed the temps were much cooler than previous days. Knowing very hot days are ahead, we enjoyed it. We continued on I-64 West from yesterday and traffic was light. We decided we like this highway much better than I-70 a bit further north that we took across the Midwest on a previous trip. The I-64 goes through fewer big cities and has less traffic, at least on the portions we've driven so far.

We were making good time and didn't need to stop for a morning break. A truck driver honked his cool air horn at us so he could get our attention to wave at us. Nice man! From Indiana we crossed into Illinois at 10am. This part of Illinois is corn country and it seems to be thriving. To pass the time, Michele likes to look at license plates and the truck cab personalization, usually the truckers have their name/company name and city they are based out of written on the driver door. On this one, both cab and trailer were from Minnesota (Rob says "Go Muskrats!").

We crossed into Missouri around Noon. 

Traffic was easy until we approached St. Louis, then it got busy and hectic. Drivers were nuts and seemed to have trouble staying in their lanes. As we approached the Mississippi River, we got a distant look at the famous arch that we visited on a trip years ago.

Across the way in Madison there was what we discovered to be an industrial fire. Approaching it we could tell something was unusual about the weird cloud, then upon getting closer the black smoke was billowing into the sky.

Later at lunch, Rob found a local news story that said it was an explosion and fire at an industrial recycling warehouse. Nearby residents were told to shelter in place!

Rob planned our lunch stop at the Walnut Grill in St. Clair, MO. It has a really nice covered outdoor eating area. We stopped for fuel close by before lunch and learned that the GPS thought we already made our lunch stop. After fueling up it routed us onward west! Rob got it sorted out. We found the restaurant and had a leisurely lunch.

After lunch, Rob had planned our first scenic road of the trip, Missouri Route 94. He found this in our Scenic Drives book. It is a 130+ mile stretch that travels along the bluffs of the Missouri River, flanked by wineries (especially in an area named Augusta) and farmland.  It also includes the Katy Trail State Park that has a bike trail throughout. At times we could see the river up close, then up into elevation we had glances of it below. The route is definitely scenic.

We saw a cute gray donkey and a few goats of different colors. 

Finishing Route 94 near Jefferson City, we turned north onto US-63 and made the short 33 mile trip to our destination of the day in Columbia, MO, arriving around 3:45pm. We checked into our room but Michele discovered that the air conditioning system wouldn't allow the fan to run continuously. That meant that the fan would cut on and off as the AC's compressor needed to come on to cool the room. The on/off cycle of the fan wakes Michele up during the night so after some discussions with the Hampton Inn staff, we moved to another room where the AC worked correctly.

We ordered our dinner for take-out from the Cracker Barrel next door at around 6:30pm. Tomorrow we head out for Dodge City, KS and have reservations in the morning to visit the Budweiser Clydesdale horses at the nearby Warm Springs Ranch just outside of Columbia, MO.