Day 20 - Carthage, Missouri to Baxter Springs, Kansas

Day 20 of our tour
October 23, 2016
36.8 miles today
1498 feet of climbing
(908 miles, cumulative)
(34,858 feet of climbing, cumulative)


We were not in a rush to leave this morning as we knew we were going less than 40 miles. We had two possible stopping points, and we ended up going for the second one, a motel in Baxter Springs, Kansas. We've now crossed both Illinois and Missouri, and today we passed 900 miles on the road.

The day was sunny and warm, but not sweltering hot. The wind was mostly a headwind, but not fierce.  We arrived shortly after 3:00 and, as usual, have done laundry, checked mail and have done some reading (Jean) and working to post previous day's photos (Mark).

The bike worked fine, we're healthy, and no dogs have come our way yet.  We did ride for about 30 minutes today with a local fellow who was out for a solo ride on his own and stopped to chat. He was timely in his stop, as he told us about a road closure ahead that we would have found, and he led us around it on another route. He told us some stories of being chased by dogs, and we hope we don't have his experience. 

Update: The camera connected fine many hours after I uploaded our first post for today. Maybe it just gets tired from its long days on the job and needs a rest.

Here are today's photos...

We passed this soon after leaving Carthage:

When we got to Joplin we saw this sign. Jean's good friend Ginny was a McKee at birth, and her uncle was mayor of Joplin for many years:

This fellow stopped to talk and help us with the route:

His dog deterrent is a squeeze bottle of hot pepper sauce from the grocery. He keeps it in a holster under his seat:

Joplin was a mining town in the past. This would have been a mine owner's home, we were told by the cyclist, who was a local resident:

We reached Kansas:

These small towns established years ago have main streets with some nice facades and open stores interspersed with others that are deteriorating. This is Galena:

This market outside Galena in Riverton is a well-known Route 66 landmark:

As is this bridge:

Again as we entered our last town for the day, Baxter Springs, we passed some large, fancy homes, such as this one:

And another gas station preserved from the past. Some other tourists were doing a photo shoot at this moment, and there is a girl lying between the pumps:

Two shots of the Baxter Springs main street:

When we reached the end of old main street we found a newer grocery, bought some supplies, chatted with the boy scouts and their moms who were selling popcorn to raise money, and cycled the last mile to the Baxter Inn for the night.