June 12, 2001 - Mike and Marilyn's 2001 TranAmerican Bike Tour

Hodgenville to Rough River Dam State Park, Kentucky. (58 mi.) Mile 1036

From market to market to get out of the heat

I am typing on the laptop in a campground laundromat again. Today was actually the best riding for me yet, despite the temperature getting up to about 94 degrees. Scenery earlier in the trip has been as beautiful, but now I am feeling stronger as well. As we were rolling through the early morning landscape, with the cooler temperatures and humidity just lifting, I thought how sad it would be for this to eventually end.

Amish farm country

We have been going through countryside where any Amish have their farms. These are recognizable by the lack of cars and power lines around the simple farmhouses and barns. We passed by five Amish children using hand tools to weed a field of tobacco. The girls were wearing dark dresses and bonnets, the boys in dark trousers, blue shirts, and broad brimmed hats. All were barefoot. They stopped to watch us pass, and one little girl waved at us like school children have everywhere. I rang my bike bell for her, and she smiled back in the usual response.

The Helms left ahead of us this morning, as we have still not mastered The Early Start. We'll have to get this down yet, because the temperature quickly climbed into the 80s by 11 am. The remainder of the day, we leapfrogged with the Helms from one small general store to another every ten miles or so to escape the heat. This involved walking into the store hot and sweaty and standing in front of the refrigerated beverages until we cooled off. Almost every small market got our business, and each significant intersection had a small market. One of these had a book in which they asked any TransAmerica bicyclists to sign in, so we signed in right after Walter, who had passed through yesterday, and looked at the list of other cyclists who had signed it over the last few years.

One of the countless small general stores we have stopped at on this trip.

This one was noted for having some of the flooring held together with duct tape.

Escaping the heat

Just before our campground destination at Rough River Dam State Park, we joined Peter and Maren at a restaurant a few miles away to place a take-out order to be delivered to our campsite later. By the time our chicken dinner arrived, we were ready for it.

Waiting for the arrival of our chicken dinner