June 25th, Eminence, MO - Farmington, MO
Day 31
Another morning of waking up sweating in the hot weather. And while this morning was tougher than others as I had lost many of belongings and was very tired, God’s strength seems to surpass all understanding. But, it is funny how bad things sometimes happen in threes.
While these things are pretty trivial in comparison to the hardships people face, I had to laugh at the first 25 miles of the day. Of course losing my things was tough, but then as I was riding up the steep hills of the Ozarks I had a couple more mishaps. While trying to summit one hill, I took a drink of my water but missed the water holster on my bike and watched my water bottle roll of the road and down into a ditch. So I had to get off my bike and stop in the middle of a hill which was a little frustrating. Then, not 20 minutes later, I was climbing another hill and I guess I wasn’t going fast enough to keep a wasp from landing on me. So, while riding a wasp stung me on the lower back which helped propel me up the hill. Not my favorite motivation but as Forrest Gump says, “God is mysterious” in the ways He helps you. So I let out a yell of frustration but was able to laugh off my small misfortunes and continue peddling.
We made it to Farmington, MO at about 4pm and the place we will be staying at for today and our rest day tomorrow is awesome. It is called “Al’s Place” and is a bike hostel. It looks like a New York City loft apartment and is perfect for us. We have showers, bunk beds, and television to watch the World Cup. We then went out to Colton’s Steak house and had a wonderful steak dinner, special thanks to Scott and Amy Haga for buying our dinner. We continued to veg out and rest after 6 days of riding in a row. Our next ride on sunday will cross us over to Illinois and we are very excited to soon enter our home state of Kentucky.
In His Adventure,
Chaz Vittitow
