Kentucky Ride; Day 2

A word of caution regarding the Rosener Motel.  It could be called the Gross-ner motel; NOT recommended, though the staff was friendly.

The news was telling us this morning about a large fog bank covering an area 200 miles wide.  According to the map, the fog was just south of us.  It was.

We rode south on 67 to Farmington, MO and into the fog where we caught Hwy 32 eastbound, which took us all the way to Ste. Genevieve, MO.  This is an old Mississippi River town with some neat looking buildings downtown.

Just north of Ste. Genevieve we caught the ferry (not to be confused with the “fairy”) across the Mississippi River.  It was a fun and interesting ride.The ferry dumped us in Illinois and we made it to Hwy 3 southbound via county roads.  Along Hwy 3 we rode into fog again.

Hwy 3 took us into Chester, IL, which is proclaimed as the “Home of Popeye”.  We found a Popeye Park and learned that Elzie C. Segar, the creator of Popeye, was born and raised in Chester and the character, Wimpy, was inspired by a local named William Schuchert.

There was some beautiful fall foliage along Hwy 3.

Our intent today was to do some sight-seeing and hiking in the Shawnee National Forest in southern IL but the fog was bad enough that we decided to head east on Hwy 149.  Perhaps we’ll stop here on the way home.

The ride from Murphysboro, IL to Marion, IL was a drag; a lot of stop and go riding. The highlight, however, was a stop at a Honda motorcycle dealer in Carbondale to check out the 2012 Goldwings. Chris and I still like black.

We stopped for some lunch at KFC in Harrisburg, IL and then rode north on Hwy 45.  At Hwy 141 we rode east across the Wabash River into Indiana, where the highway becomes Hwy 62.  At Evansville we caught Hwy 66 east and south to Grandview, IN.  We got a picture of the Ohio River in Grandview and learned that, long ago, Thomas and Nancy Lincoln crossed the Ohio River in this area (from Kentucky to Indiana) with their children, one named Abe.  They settled in an area 17 miles north (Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial).

We rode north on Hwy 245 to Santa Claus, IN (this was Chris’ idea) and checked out their museum, church, and statue.

From Santa Claus we took Hwy 162 west to the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial.  We got there at 4:30 and since it closed at 5:00 we decided to find a motel and return tomorrow to give the memorial a proper checking out.

We stopped for the day at the Best Western Lincoln Land motel north of Dale, IN.  It was a fun day of riding (285 miles) with some very pretty fall foliage along the way.  As an added bonus we leaned that the Kansas State Wildcat football team beat Iowa State in Ames today – BOO YEA! 

For more pictures from today click on the following link: https://picasaweb.google.com/104542123131082631220/KentuckyRideDay2?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCNfVwrDvoa6gmQE&feat=directlink