The week leading up to entering our home state was an eventful one, to say the least. Just outside the Missouri-Illinois border, Thomas and I met back up with Garrett and Harris in the little town of Chester, home of Popeye the Sailer, just before crossing the Mississippi. Crossing into Missouri,
We'd been through Missouri many times. This was home country. Or so we thought....
Little did we know, the Ozarks a la bicycle-seat weren't quite the same stretches of Missouri we remembered.
Indeed, the image of Missouri we held in our heads looked a lot more like this:
Than this:
And in a nutshell, that photo describes exactly what our following 7 days would be. Climbing, up then down. For miles, upon miles, upon grueling, exhausting mile. Evidently, Missouri is the state with most total elevation change, thanks to the expansive area known as the Ozarks Mountains.
And to boot, Missouri welcomed us with a host of additional problems. Garrett's two highest gears had quit working. Thomas got heat exhaustion and had to hitch-hike his way to safety in the nearest town's air-conditioned hotel. (Our first hotel of the entire trip). Between Indiana and Missouri somewhere, I had caught poison ivy, which between the heat and the sweat, only worsened the more we rode. Plus, Missouri was home to what seemed like battalions of pesky mosquitos. Unable to differentiate between mosquito bite and poison ivy, I just spread the shit everywhere, as I scratched my legs, my waste, my back, my arms, my.....
The most eventful segment of the week, however, occurred the first night in Missouri, when we stayed in Farmington. So happy with our 80 mile ride in, we opted to celebrate our reunion together with a trip to the local Chinese Buffet.
Upon entry into the place, the first thing I noticed was the clientele: white, smelly, tatooed, and reeking of welfare. (As a flaming liberal, I have a certain degree of ethical disquietude at using the word "reeking" here, but hey... I'm painting a picture). The environment was near silent, except for the occasional shriek from the kitchen and a group of kids running around their table as their father chowed down and their distraught mother sat wiping the youngest's nose. The smell of smoke permeated the air, drifting in from "smoker's section" (where the zone began and ended, was up for interpretation). We were greeted by your typical chinese hostess (typical, insomuch as she was the only employee with any degree of english speaking ability whatsoever). She pointed vaguely at the dining room, and we took it to mean that we should seat ourselves. We needed no further directions.
As we made our way through the dining room, we got a few glowers from our neighboring tables, but we paid little attention. We were on one mission: food. However, just as we had laid down our hats and things at our selected table and made the move for the buffet line--the unexpected happened. One of the many kids playing tag around their parents table had stopped for a bite of kung-pao and gotten a chunk lodged in her throat. It took a second to ascertain what was going on, as the mother frantically began slapping her child's back and calling desperately for help. As we looked back toward the table, I noticed (incredibly, in hindsight) that not a single person in the restaurant had so much as put their fork down for the crisis. Instead, 34 heads merely turned toward the center of the room and sat silently as the little girl turn blue, as if annoyed at the disturbance to the meal.
In a twist of irony, just that morning Thomas had turned to me on the bikes and wondered aloud how many people die each year because of a lack of basic emergency medicine education. Fortunately for the little girl (because apparently neither her fellow patrons nor the onlooking, openmouthed asian staff had any idea), I jumped in to perform the heimlich. After a nerve-racking nine thrusts, the piece of chicken finally emerged (in a very anti-climactic gag), and the restaurant went back to eating. The father grumbled something of a "thanks," and our waitress asked us if we wanted more soda (we hadn't ordered anything yet).
Here we sit after the whole debacle, laughing about the bizarre situation that had just taken place.
Just before leaving, after we each had paid, I noticed that the sign for the buffet had said $8.99 + tax... which seemed odd since the waitress had charged each of us $10.70 apiece. When I approached the counter about this, the hostess off-handedly replied "yes, pus tax", and looked the other way. I asked her how much tax was in Missouri. She just repeated "eight nine nine pus tax". Then, when I pressed her, she yelled into the kitchen in chinese, whipped around and handed me a dollar, saying "whoops, our bad" and kindly pointed me to the door.
So much for heroics.
That night, we stayed in a city jail that had been converted into a bicycler-only hostel, which was really fun. At about 4 am however, I awoke startled to hear what sounded like a cow attempting to dislodge and regurgitate one of its stomachs. I looked around the room wildly, trying to deduce what the heck was making such a blood-curdling noise, when I realized it was coming from the bathroom. Garrett's cot was empty.
I jumped up to run to the bathroom, when I was greeted by Harris whose tired, glum face sighed "food poisoning". It seems the restaurant had had one last laugh.
Sure enough, it was later determined that Garrett had been the only one of us to sample the shrimp. My advice though? If you're ever in Farmington, don't go to China Buffet.
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Below are a series of highlight photos from our trip out of Illinois and through the Ozarks.
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| Early morning, leaving Louisville and crossing the Ohio River. |
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| The Mighty Mississippi |
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| never seen an armadillo before. here's one that didn't make it. |
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| Midday Swim |
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| Always gotta stay vigilant on the road. |
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| Well this can't be right, can it? |
