Thursday, June 27th, 2024
St. Louis, MO to Hermann, MO
82.9 miles, 1,837 feet elevation
I had never thought I would describe sleeping bags as cozy. But it was 5am and here I was, as warm as I had ever been in my own bed at home. Part of that warmth, however, was from a burning sensation in my knee. I had no intention of getting up and facing the day. I rolled back over and tried to ignore the morning and those awake around me.
By 5:40, I had accepted my fate and rolled out of bed. The day was a long one, 80 miles, but the beginning of the Katy trail, which we had been talking about since the beginning of the trip. But first we had 20 miles of suburbs to wade through. I set off with Amulya and we ventured through main streets, universities, rolling hills, and roads that periodically merged with highway exit ramps (at one point, I merged across two big lanes to make a left only to realize that it was a wrong turn). Eventually, we marked our departure from society with a water refill at the most hard core gym I’ve ever stepped foot in.
We crossed the Missouri River and with that, we were on the Katy Trail!
The Katy Trail is a 240 mile trail from an old train route that went through Missouri, Kansas, and Texas (MKT then became Katy). I was so excited to be away from cars. And now we had 50 straight miles through nature. It was quite a change from anything we’d been through in the past few weeks.
By mile 35, I was starving and pulled over for a super quick lunch next to these painted towers (I don’t actually know what they are please enlighten me) and many, many bugs.
I wasn’t able to get the gnawing hunger out of my system, and stopping my ride to continually grab snacks was just unsustainable. Tired and desperate, I looked to distract myself with a five and a half hour podcast about French history. It was an episode of a cheesy but entertaining art history podcast called ArtHoles which I had been obsessed with in 2022 but hadn’t listened to since. I immersed myself in terrible jokes about Louis XIV, detailed records of objects stolen from Napoleon after his death, and a great appreciation for Marie Antoinette.
I was also bolstered by meeting a MIT alum on the trail who was out biking (Hi Ed!). For the last thirty miles, I held on through my dumb podcast and waving at any biker who passed me. It was a brief recognition of our shared humanity and the crazy act of biking and all the pains and joys that come with it. Or at least it’s become that for me, and helped me to keep going.
I finally arrived in Hermann (later than everyone else) and greeted the rest of the team at an ice cream shop next to a cafe, two of our favorite Spokes stops. From there we biked up to one of the coolest places we’ve stayed: a treehouse!!!
I then began one of the most necessary activities of Spokes: staring vacantly. I was trying to be productive, but I really just collapsed. I was finally brought back to life by a delicious dinner of poke bowls made by Sophia, JD, and Cleo. And some great storytime from other teammates. We often go around and make each other tell stories about our lives, from the silly to the serious. I’d been alone for a lot of the day, with the large mileage and my general slowness, and I was so happy to talk until it was dark and we realized we needed to sleep.