The travels of the Rambling Roses: Bicycling from Poplar Bluff, Missouri to Sikeston, MO April 22

April 22.....59.88 miles in 5:18...mileage total for the trip so far is 14,866.4 miles... I woke up this morning with my legs feeling like pan fried flank steaks, a little tired from negotiating the never tall but ever rolling Ozark Mountains. Today, the wind was blowing out of the northeast, and I was traveling northeast. Need I say more? By the end of the day my legs felt like they had been cooking in a crock pot for a week. So much so that I got the ice bags out and rapped them on my quads while watching TV and blogging.

I rolled through the pleasant little (17,000) town of Poplar Bluffs on business60, until I came to the bluff that the town was named after, overlooking the Black River. The Black River is the east boundary of the Ozarks, as I was soon to find out. As soon as I crossed the bridge over the river, the land became absolutely pancake flat. I mean, flat line flat. The rest of my ride was a flat as anyplace I have ridden. It couldn't have gotten any flatter. I was cruising at about 325 ft above sea level, very low. And did I mention that it got real flat? I learned later that pioneers found cypress swamps here, and undertook a huge project to drain the area and make it farmland. Supposedly they moved more dirt here than they did to build the Panama Canal. I was riding in serious farm country, and the farmers were just beginning to turn their dirt in some of the fields. Every road had a ditch along side it, and there were uncountable numbers of streams that were laid out through the fields, some bigger and more full of water than others. I had read that President Bill Clinton's dad was killed in an auto accident near Sikeston, when he drowned in a roadside ditch. It sounded weird at the time, but I understand now. All this flatness made for an undying wind, which I am not very fond of. I would rather climb mountains all day than pedal into a relentless wind, but I probably have said that before. More headwind tomorrow .

I could have taken US 60 four lane for the entire trip, but I deviated from that course a little. I took business 60 through Poplar Bluff, which might have added on about 5 miles, and at my halfway point, I took business 60 through the flat as flatbread town of Dexter, MO. That is where I decided to do some back roads. I took MO 25 south out of town to MO 114, where I headed east. This road had some traffic, zero shoulder, bumpy surface, but it got me off of four lane for a while, which is smoother, quicker, and yes safer, but that's how I like to roll. I got to see some snakes, frogs, and pterodactyls that I wouldn't see on the main road, and I experienced some of the biggest farm tractor traffic I've ever seen. I went through small towns like Essex, where Main Street was gravel, and a bar had a sign advertising Stag Beer. Really? Yes. I've actually heard of it because I have a can from the seventies in my now forty year old beer can collection.

MO 114 paralleled US60 for a while, then eventually crossed over to the north side of it, and thank goodness, the road became lined with some native trees. It's amazing how a row of trees will cut down on wind, on the open plains. This road took me into the tri cities of Morehouse, Sikeston, and Minor, where Pam found a campground right next to Interstate 55, which goes north to St. Louis and south to Memphis.

I have been looking for a Pizza Inn restaurant, which is where I worked back in Wheeling as an eighteen year old, and met many of my life's best friends. I knew they were still in the southern states, and today I found one, so we HAD to go there for supper. I expected to walk right back into the seventies when I walked in, but obviously lots had changed about the way they do business. It was a buffet, with a reduced menu, and no beer, different from my day. I recognized the pizza sauce recipe that taught me to like pizza as a young punk, but it wasn't as good as I remember. I was going to get a pizza to go, but I decided not to. Things from your youth should stay as fantasies that can't be brought back, I guess.