Day 31 - St. Joseph to Chillicothe - 90 miles

First day after a rest day - raring to go! :) We ended up riding into the first sag stop with the big boys. We started off before them and joined in when they came past. It's fun and challenging to ride at the faster pace but you have to pay attention to where everyone is and what's happening because things can go wrong in a hurry. After a bit I thought "I'm just not having any fun here!" So I waved people on by me, then hopped on at the end again, thinking that way I could just drop off if I felt like it. Ended up finishing up the 30 miles with them, then we decided to back it off and go our own pace - meaning me and Fiona.

Leaving St Joe's with a hazy sky

Missouri continues to be green and treat us to lots of hills!

Our second sag stop of the day was in Jamesport which appears to be a community with a high concentration of Amish and Mennonite families. We stopped at a small restaurant there for some lunch. One guy asked the waitress what the difference was between the Amish and the Mennonites and she said basically the Mennonites drive cars and the Amish don't. I didn't sample the pie but it looked fabulous!

The main intersection in town.

After leaving Jamesport, we were cycling along and came up with Vern. Vern is from Oklahoma and kind of likes to be left alone while he cycles. Not very chatty. So I took it upon myself to see how much chat I could get out of him. :) Not too much before he indicated that he was not interested in chatting with me! He called us magpies and plead with Texas Barry to run us off. Texas Barry can actually talk us both under the table but I guess he doesn't talk that much around Vern. Anyway, I was highly amused by the interchange.

As we were coming into Chillicothe, we came across this!

Fiona had to come to America to find out how famous she is. :) She says there are crocodiles in her river.

Chillicothe's claim to fame is "The home of sliced bread"

They have a lot of cool murals.

One of the best parts of the day was meeting up with Marilyn Lofgreen from Morgan Utah! Currently serving as an LDS missionary in Chillicothe, MO. She and her companion, Sister Knudsen, picked us up at the motel and we went to Washington Street Food Company for a great dinner and a fun visit.

Very fun!!