The Rush to Iowa City

The next few days were a blur of speed for me. I needed to get to Evansville in time for a rental car reservation to get to my best friend’s wedding. Louisville has an extensive series of bike paths that go to the far stretches of the city, so I took those as far as they would go.

I continued on to Otter Creek Outdoor Recreation Area, only to realize for some reason they’re closed on Tuesdays and I couldn’t camp there. So very last minute I found a hotel not too far away and spent the night there. I had taken to pausing at least once in the middle of my rides to take a break in the shade, or at a coffee shop, so I stopped in Brandenburg to write in my journal and have a cup of coffee. I rode down the street to look at a riverside park and ran into two math professors. We chatted about where I was going and why, I gave one of them a link to my blog and continued toward Indiana.

I spent the night at O’Bannon Woods State Forest, and befriended a couple headed from Florida to Zion, Utah to see family. They gave me coffee in the morning, and just as I was about to head out it started to rain. I used three different GPS that morning to find the best way out of the park. They all told me for some reason to go down a gravel path to the northwest. It was a bumpy ride, downhill in the rain. The trail was for cyclists, hikers and horses. The first sign that I should turn around was when the path said no cyclists, but I persisted all the way to the bottom of the trail where there was supposed to be a bridge. Well, there was a bridge. It was a a railroad bridge with two iron tracks and no ties between them. A dead end. It was pouring and I’d already gone 2 miles down this path. The path was already muddy so I wound up walking my bike all the way back up to the top of the hill. When I got to the beginning of the path, I was beaten, and I was right back at the campground I’d started at. I called my mom in tears. The hills were hard enough without unnecessary mileage. Every GPS I had refused to route me out of the forest another way, and I had to get to Evansville in time for the rental car!

My mom felt pretty helpless with me crying, half a continent away. She wound up calling Hoosier National Forest hoping for sympathy. I don’t know what she expected them to do. After building up as much strength as I could muster, I started biking the two miles out of the campground and around the state forest in the pouring rain.

By lunchtime I reaches the Overlook Restaurant, and the rain was finally starting to die down. I stopped for lunch and was thrilled to see a marker for the Lewis and Clark Trail hidden on the lawn behind the restaurant. I got to Hoosier National Forest, my spirit and my life force completely drained. I stopped at Tipsaw Lake. Shortly after I got to my campsite, two of the people from the office I paid at showed up. It seems Julie and her husband Al got my message, and came to start a campfire for me and give me water and food. They told me if I was in a pinch getting to Evansville they would come bail me out.

I met Hoosier National Forest’s “corporate office” the next morning as I was leaving the campground, and once again biked two miles out of the campground before I was back on my intended road. My morale was boosted. The weather was vastly improved.

I took a break for lunch in Tell City. I was chased by even more dogs. By this point I was pretty sure if anything was going to cause me to give up on this entire journey it was going to be near death experiences with these dang dogs. I stopped for ice cream, called a friend and tried to make a decision about how much further I was going to go today. I had a campground in mind up the road a ways. I liked the idea of getting to Evansville early enough to see the sites and check in with my car rental to be sure everything was in order for my trip.

Once again, the decision was made for me. I got another flat. My rear tire again. The tread was basically gone. I knew it. I made sure that the bike repair place in Iowa City that was going to give me a tuneup had my tire in stock for my visit weeks before I even left. So I changed my tire and went to the closer campground. I set up my tent, chatted with the campground owner. He gave me his business card, again in case I needed to be bailed out on my way to Evansville. He wound up letting me stay there for free when I told him about my flat tire. He warned me it was supposed to rain, and he was right. It was a thunderstorm. I saw the lightening on the horizon before it hit, and huddled in my tent as the downpour began. My tent held up, no leaks, and I continued on to Evansville in the morning.

I rode along the Ohio, not feeling at my utmost. My GPS took me on back roads for a while. I don’t know if it was that night or before, but there was a mudslide on the road, the residue stretched across the entire lane, so I hade to cautiously route around it. I saw a man on a scooter turn down the road ahead of me, heard barking and saw him racing around the corner and back in the direction he came from. I was not going to get chased by a dog again, so I turned and headed back for the highway. Blessedly I found a park by a dam just when I needed it and right before Evansville. I stopped for a break. My stomach was not doing well, and for the third time on my rush to Evansville, a man, this time a cyclist, stopped to chat with me about my trip and gave me his number in case I needed to be bailed out. I didn’t. I stopped at a restaurant on the water for lunch and continued on to Angel Mound Historic Site before it started raining again. I stalled inside the museum until the rain stopped, wandered through the grounds and headed to my hotel. My rear fender was dragging against my rear wheel. That paired with a headwind all the way to my hotel, I kept stopping to adjust it, and by the time I got on the road to my hotel, I was grunting and yelling in frustration as the wind fought me all the way there. But I got there, and I got my rental car without complications.

The next week and a half I spent off the road, helping my friend prepare for her wedding, celebrating, and seeing more humans than I had in the past year and a half. With that, of course I caught a respiratory infection while I was there that I’m still recovering from.