Road Works Ahead? I sure hope it does... (USA Day 27)

For some reason, today felt like a Saturday. That shouldn’t be weird, given that it really is a Saturday and all, but days of the week have up until now lost their meaning because we aren’t working on seven-day cycles. But today was so Saturdayish it hurt: we felt lethargic, floppy, and spent the entire day needing brunch.

After our three exhausting days since Columbus, Amy was understandably very tired, and not in a way that could be set right with calories. I grew really frustrated with myself being the crap motivator. “You’re doing so great, look how far we’ve come.” “In five miles it’ll only be six miles until we’ll be five miles from lunch.” “Let’s play a game. What do you want to play?” and so on. Amy doesn’t need that high-school-PE-teacher nonsense to get motivated, and I cringe when I hear my voice as I do it. Sometimes you have to just grit your teeth, put your eyes on the road and get to the end of it. Today was one of those times.

We laboured north on undemanding roads, a bit bored, a bit tired, ignoring ‘road closed’ signs to worm through multiple construction sites until one, involving a large muddy chasm, a flowing river and a tiny bridge made of an iron bar, finally defeated us and we had to retrace our steps a mile or so. The roads between Indianapolis and Chicago are one enormous grid system, all named numerically by their co-ordinates about the central point of the county seat. It’s pretty fascinating, if you’re into roads. I’m not, to be honest, so I focused on a slew of podcasts and counted down the miles.

The last fifteen of said miles dragged on forever: our knight’s passage across the grid never allowing for diagonals. Just as we reached the destination on my map, we realised there were another couple to go for the real-life destination, and I was pretty heartbroken.

Nevertheless, we made it, to an old farmhouse amongst flooded fields, for plates of rice casserole and home-canned apple sauce, then delicious rhubarb dream pie. Our plan is to sleep so heavily that we wake refreshed, because there’s three more days to Chicago and they won’t cycle themselves.

Today: 65 Miles

Total: 1077 Miles