029 Day 36, May 14: Rochester to Dinwiddie IND: 74 miles today and 1205 in total (m270.7)

This morning we woke up after a fitful sleep and when I took this photo of Christine, I knew today would be special in another way. It was. We had a loong day in the saddle and completed 74 miles in total - our longest daily progress to date. It came with a lot of effort and tonight we are going to bed soon. 

While the hair is pointing in all directions, the eyes show a steeliness that is not always there.

We cycled through Rochester to get a view of some of the downtown buildings.

We cycled on the road for most of the day and these two photos sum up what we saw early - one shows where we came from and one shows where we are going. All very straight roads.

Just outside Delong we crossed the Tippecanoe River,

and followed it for a while.

Beautiful reflections in the river.

We saw these trees along one of the roads.

We entere the Town of Monterey after crossing the Tippecanoe again. The old station is the center point for the short Tippecanoe Bike Trail. It follows an old rail line and we trust that the State will soon find funds to extend the Trail.

We also met up with Scott Luria in Monterey. We met last night at the hotel and we expected to meet along the Trails today. He started cycling in Maine and is on a one year long cycling trip to the West Coast and back, with the intention to visit as many of the Highest Points of each State that he has not been to yet. 

We chatted away and the miles sort of clicked by. We soon came to the start of the Erie Trail.

This is about 7 miles long and ends at the Town of North Judson. We had a trail-side lunch of Bagels with peanut butter and honey, apples and biltong (Thanks Elsabe Fourie of Columbus OH for these treats. 😄😄😄).

This is a well-designed trail with some curvy sections and well-designed road crossings.

We came across this bike sculpture at the North Judson Trailhead. This is one of the better Trailheads we have seen so far - good job prairietrailsclub.com!!!

After lunch we had to stop for an icecream at the Point in North Judson.

After the stop, Scott and our routes diverged for a while. We cycled past the Kankakee and Yellow River National Fishing Area and enjoyed the view. Here the river(s) has five channels and each one is as beautiful as the other. 

We saw the Town of LaCrosse in the distance.

This area is very flat and looks like prime irrigation land. There are large sprinklers all over and these drainage channels criss-cross the agricultural fields. We saw Muskrats in some of these ditches.

We caught up with Scott again and we collectively decided to aim for the Super 8-hotel at Dinwiddie. 

The roads remained the same - the photo with the flags show where we came from and the next photo where we are going to.

We reached the Hebron cemetery late afternoon. I was knackered but still had time to take a photo of where we came from and where we are going to (with Christine included). 

This is the W 900S Road and we cycled in a straight line for more than 12 miles

I saw Christine was tired but very happy tonight after this long day and after some fresh salad and pizza slices from Aurelio's Pizza. Thanks for pulling me along today, Christine and Scott. 

Tomorrow morning we shall plan the Chicago stretch.