Day 29: Thousand Hills State Park, 148 "Roller Coaster" Hills, Picnic Lunch

Gil's cliff notes for Day 27 were added this evening.

Additional cliff notes/story from Gil for Day 25 added at the end of that day's post.

Pictures added to this post by Jean at 2:15 am.

Gil's cliff notes for Day 29 (written 6:45 pm Saturday)
Beautiful day of riding. The 148 hills that were passed off as "roller coaster hill" at road rap were misrepresented. Unlike a roller coaster where you could coast to the top of the next hill, you had to pedal your little heart out, sweat some blood, and stand on the pedals while in your lowest gear. These hills started at mile 25 and went on relentlessly until we reached the hotel. My legs - calves and knees are sore - I wonder why. Total cumulative climbing today was 4800 ft. according to a couple of cyclists' Garmin's (satellite GPS device). [See Dale to the right. -Jean]

MO is a beautiful state. The roads are not the best but the people are very nice. I've included a couple of pics of the hills [to be added later....too late at night for me to be learning 'photo insertion' -Jane]. Note the riders on the hills as they give some scale to these hills. Arrived hotel around 2 PM. Dale did great riding. He carried video camera today and will carry and tape while on tour.

During our phone conversation this evening, Gil told me it was great having Dale on the ride today.....he did very well and did the video taping for the day. The ride started out with the bikers riding through rolling countryside for the first 25 miles. Then they reached the hills-----continuous hills, NO FLAT areas------for 50 relentless miles. (Darn, doesn't that sound like lots of fun?) By the time they reached the first SAG stop at 50 miles, they were all tired of HILLS.

Beautiful day, beautiful countryside....with cattle and horses and rolling terrain. It was a tremendous workout, but they all made it. Very friendly people, reminds Gil of Mayberry, RFD (The Andy Griffith Show on TV for you younger readers). Tomorrow's ride should be a little gentler, with less hills.....Gil hopes so because the day after tomorrow is a 107 mile ride to Champaign, IL.