a.k.a. I thought is was supposed to be 60 today!!
OK, it's early March, nothing to do over a weekend, let's ride. Weather forecast called for sunny and temps in the 60s. We decided to head down to Missouri, and enjoy a nice Saturday ride through the Ozarks.
We left work a little early on Friday, and made it down to Springfield, IL in no time. This was the first real ride out of the year, after I had made bike changes over the off-season. My jetting was close, but I was burning pretty rich in the midrange, and my mileage suffered. I was down about 3 MPG, which doesn't sound like a lot, but when you're riding with a guy on a VFR who doesn't think about hitting reserve until about 220 miles, losing mileage is a no-no. So, we started out down I-72 towards Quincy, IL, and watched a nice sunset. Then the cold came. Perfect time to truly demo the heated handgrips and vest. They worked flawlessly. We stopped for gas about 1/2 hour outside of Quincy, and I was colder just standing around than I was while on the bike. We stayed the night in Hanibal, MO, and got a good night's sleep for once.
The next day, we started out by enjoying the ride down the Mississippi River, and the ride was great. Very scenic views, nice roads, and even though the roads were cold, there were some nice sections with fresh pavement where we could start to push it a bit. We continued across the Missouri countryside, and after a lunch stop, started heading down Missouri state route 21. What a fantastic ride. It was well worth the ride down here to enjoy such nice roads and scenery. We got to Sikeston, MO that night, had a decent smorgasborg type dinner, and picked up a few 32 ounce beers at the gas station on the way back to the hotel. For $1.16 for Miller Lite, you can't go wrong. We then caught the updated weather report for Sunday. Highs in the low 50s, and rain throughout the entire state of Illinois. Where the hell did this come from!!! I thought it was gonna be 60 tomorrow!! We drank our beer, and went to bed, dreading the ride home the next day.
We awoke to a slight drizzle. Great, it's started already. We suited up, loaded up on coffee, and started the long trek toward Chicago. It was cold, we got a little light rain, but it wasn't as bad as we had feared. We made pretty good time, and were home by mid-afternoon.
All in all, the Saturday ride more than made up for the ride there and back. If we have a free weekend in the fall, I'd love to ride down there and do this again.
Here are some pictures from the trip: