Day 5

As expected, mornings start a lot easier when I don't have to pack up my gear, and when there's a bathroom right down the hall. By 7:30, I was up and ready to go before my hosts were awake, so I let myself out. Today started out with Indiana State Route 7, which was finally a road going almost exactly in the direction I wanted to travel, southeast. Not only did this mean that my "on the road" distance was comparable to the "as the crow flies" distance, but it also meant that I had tricked the ever-present southerly winds into actually helping me a bit with the included westerly component.

My stage one target was Madison, about 40 miles away and on the banks of the Ohio River. You know the Ohio is a serious river, because there are very few bridges crossing it along Indiana's southern border, and it becomes a major obstacle that you have to plan the trip around. So the bridge at Madison seemed like a good choice. The miles to Madison were already quite a bit more hilly than anything I'd seen so far, with river crossings getting more frequent as I neared the Ohio. Then I finally hit the point where I dropped down into the Ohio valley. What a rush that was! Twisting, turning, diving. It was probably less than a mile, and it went by really quickly when coasting at 34mph (and braking hard at the switchbacks). I'd definitely never done anything like that before, and I'd almost ride across Indiana again to get that thrill at the end.

Madison lies at the bottom of that big hill, and although it was only 10:30, I stopped and refueled at a Subway (I've got a ton of Subway coupons!) Of course, what comes down must also go back up, at least when crossing river valleys. First was the bridge. It's long and narrow, so on the first half I was backing up traffic behind me, but once I hit the downhill half I could go at their speed. And then, I was in Kentucky! So it took me about four days to cross from the northwest corner to the southeast end of the state. As a reward, I lost an hour in a time zone change (or maybe I'd lost it earlier?), and I was given a giant hill to climb. So, up I went, about three switchbacks. At the second switchback, they had the road down to one lane, and the guy holding back traffic said I'd probably end up pushing it. Well, I didn't, so hah. Sure, I was working my tail off the whole way up, and I don't think I ever got the speedometer above 6.5 mph, but I believe I actually had two gears left that I didn't need. I guess I'll save them for the REALLY big hills.

So after conquering that hill, things flattened out a bit, and I took a moment to be quite pleased with myself. All the calories from that six-inch sub had probably vanished in about 10 minutes, but that's ok. And there were plenty more hills to come throughout the day. Certainly none quite as daunting, but more than I've ever faced before, and I think I decided that I sort of like 'em. Really! Or at least, I don't hate them. After all, whenever there's an uphill, there's almost always a downhill, and it just provides a whole lot more variety than a long, straight, and flat road. From eyeballing the map, it looks like I've actually made about halfway to Atlanta, in only five days (I have 13 days allotted). That, combined with my apparently non-hateful relationship with good-sized hills, bodes well for my hopes to wander a bit farther east than necessary, perhaps towards the Smoky Mountains. I'm sure I could always change my tune, and maybe I still haven't seen a real hill yet anyway, but at that point I can always just turn around and take the easier route.

So the rest of the day was spent on these rolling hills of Kentucky, mostly along US 421. I felt surprisingly strong the whole day, and the distance wasn't a problem at all, even with the hills and the headwind. I was still powering up some of the hills, out of the saddle, in the 90th mile. I'd realized that on these rides my legs never really get tired at all, it's more that I just generally get sick of being on the bike for so long, so I figured I'd be fine pushing a little harder like that. Seemed to work. I dunno if it was because of the easy night, or the fact that the wind was a little less strong, or if I'm just getting stronger as the trip goes on, but hopefully I can make myself slow down a bit now so that I don't get to Atlanta a week early!

A stop in tiny New Castle found a tiny grocery store advertising home-made ice cream. I picked two little styrofoam cups out of the freezer (peach and banana), found the one Gatorade on the random-beverage shelf, and ate them at a little table inside the store. Good stuff. As I rolled on to Eminence, the skies behind me were beginning to get pretty dark. I was watching the clouds ahead of me, trying to figure which way things were going (the wind at the ground was still from the southwest), and I wondered why I hadn't watched the cloud patterns before. Suddenly I realized that these were the first clouds I'd seen on the whole trip. Anyway, I made it all the way to my destination at Guist Creek Lake State Park, just east of Shelbyville, and it only started raining after I was leaving the campground office.

If anyone is thinking that this adventure is lacking a bit in adventure, here's a good bit. Turns out they wouldn't give me a campsite, because there's some giant family reunion that has the place all booked up (the campground is actually a private thing, not state park-related). I sat in the office for a while trying to come up with alternatives, or seeing if they'd figure out an alternative for me, and finally they did! The guy in the office mentioned that sometimes people used to camp over by the fishing area near the creek/lake. That was only about half-a-mile away, instead of the 7 or 8 it would be backwards to a campground (or I was thinking even a motel, depending on the rain) back in Shelbyville. So I went and checked it out, rolling the bike back through the woods, and found a pretty good spot that you'd have to be looking really hard for to be able to find. It never rained too much, but I set my tent up in the drizzle, and even managed to do some cooking. So I finally got to try camping in the rain for a bit, AND free camping, both in the same night. I had hoped to camp for free at some point in this trip (after being inspired by Ken Kifer's writings on free camping while bicycle touring), so it's almost good that the initial disappointment of the full campground drove me to it. I'm sure I have a much better spot here anyhow. The only unnatural noise is from the lightly-travelled nearby road, there aren't any mosquitos, and you certainly can't beat the price!