Day 25: with(out) the sun – light rain and heavy legs

St. Louis, MO to Jefferson City, MO, 125.1 mi 3840 ft or 74.1 mi 2239 ft

The sun rose at 5:40am over St. Louis; me and Greta rose at 5 am sharp. We had a long day ahead of us. 130 miles ahead of us. No joke.

So that’s what we did. We started off going through St. Louis, seeing more parts of the city we explored yesterday, when the sun went away and it started raining. Not heavily, but consistently. This was new. We were used to the afternoon thunderstorms, but now we finally got a simple rainy day. At around mile 27 we got on the Katy trail… where we would continue for the rest of the day. The Katy trail, which used to be part of the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad (also known as the Katy, this is where the name comes from) at 260 miles total distance, mostly by the Missouri river, is the longest developed rail-trail in the US. It is fine gravel, used by cyclists, runners and walkers, with occasional bathrooms and benches maintained. No water fountains, but we asked for some at a restaurant and also realised that we don’t really drink nearly as much in the cool rain. In the rain, the gravel got nice and mushy, which had the effect of reduced speed and muddy backs.

Despite this gloomy atmosphere, we had a great time! We chatted, played some tunes on Greta’s legendary hanging speaker, including The Sound of Music soundtrack in its entirety, as well as playing the Picnick game – a great invention and amazing way to pass the time. (If someone already explained it in their blog or if you know what it is, feel free to skip ahead.) The way it works is one person comes up with a criteria to decide if a noun is YES or NO (eg. is alive?, had more than 8 letters?, etc.). Then the game alternates between them saying something they can bring and the other person asking if they can bring something else. The goal is for the other person to guess the criteria. I struggled on Greta’s criteria for more than 10 miles and did not get it. You can ask her about it. She got mine much faster, so I can tell you that the criteria was all words with and even number of syllables.

We also took in the scenery, saw some crazy blue birds and tackled a fallen tree. Mud was everywhere. (I later found sand in my washed bibs.)

Anyways, I think it was around mile 60 when we met up with the car for some lunch. We had packed a bunch of snacks, but its really nice to have actual food (dinner leftovers!). Time until lunch had flown very quickly, but afterwards it slowly started to slow down. Luckily the sun came out for a bit and Ishaq and Tian – our driver and passenger for the day – brought Greta some (lukewarm gas station) coffee.

We kept meeting up with the car until around mile 108, when Greta shuffled to our destination to take a call and I was left on the trail with my own thoughts. The sun had dissappeared again, my butt was hurting and my legs were done with this. The air was eerie and my podcast (about espionage) did not help (and there were way too many ads). But I persevered – changed my hand position on the handlebars too many times and worked on my leftover snacks.

Last miles went by slowly. Occasionally I thought I would be on this wet trail forever and contemplated making contact with the birds or bunnies. But that was not neccessary, since I did, in fact, make it to Jefferson City. Surreal. Crazy. Iconic.

The sun set at 8:40pm over Jefferson City. I rolled in at around 8pm. Not that you could see the sun – for the most part, I could not be sure it was there. But I was sure that there was me, outside, on the Katy trail, scaring squirrels, frightening bunnies and thinking too many thoughts. Maybe I was the sun. My sun for that day was me. (read again: thinking too many thoughts)

Our rest for the night was Sarah’s place. And it was an amazing place for resting. I got hosed down, devoured dinner, got cuddles from Barbara (see below), showered and fell right asleep. I know some people stayed up to play some game, but I actually have only a very vague idea about how the rest of the team’s day had been. There is only so many hours in a day. And today, I spent them all biking.

(I don’t think a dog had ever cuddled up to me like Barbara did, missing her already.)