Day 46 - Byrnes Mill to St Louis

Today it was 60s and 70s all day. It also started with a killer hill with some 15-20% grades. Thankfully there were some 6% sections where I could recover a bit before the next really steep part. This is a photo looking down from the top. It doesn't show the steep parts. Wish I had some pictures of the steep parts but not possible to stop and restart on those sections -- would have had to walk them.

Then I did some more reasonable climbing and eventually reached the top where there were water towers. The gradual downhill that followed a ridge was great!

These nice homes on the ridge...

....had lots of trash on the other side of the road. :-(

Also on the ridge was a large confluence of high voltage power lines.

My leather biking gloves wore out with holes and lots of thin spots. Luckily this bike shop had new ones that fit me well.

I encountered some excellent trail.

And met Wade, a fellow bicyclist.

The trail went along a river.

Had many trail users.

Good signage.

The river was very full.

Yes I hit some flooded trail and had to adjust my route.

Later I encountered more nice houses and flowering trees.

This street had a walk lane instead of a sidewalk next to its bike lane.

There are some very nice houses in St Louis.

This one even has its own covered bridge.

Lots of colleges and universities too.

This university had interesting brick housing units.

My GPS lead me down this road. I trusted it because bicycles can often go where cars cannot.

And I was rewarded with a path through.

Here are more nice houses.

But even here I found a plastic water bottle in the gutter. Disposable plastic water bottles should be avoided as much as possible. After being used for a few seconds, their plastic poisons or world for another 1000 years.

St Louis has an excellent bike path around its huge and beautiful Forest Park.

Which contain lots of forested areas.

I passed by a Fox theatre showing Hamilton.

Here is the Grand Arts Academy where I'll present tomorrow.

It has a very colorful and welcoming entrance.

The school sits across from the very interesting looking Grandel.

Later I met Michael and his father Jack. Jack was fixing a broken spoke in his back wheel -- that is his bike upside down in the background. He and his son have biked all over including the Gap and C&O trails that I'll do later in my ride. 

This evening I stayed with my classmate Pauline and her husband Philip in their beautiful house.

They even had the same sign in their front yard that I have in mine.

Pauline rides her bicycle frequently :-) but alas Philip's bike does not see much use :-(

Philip is an excellent cook though and prepared a wonderful evening dinner.

They also have a friendly and oh so soft dog!