On Monday June 23 we headed for Winona on the bikes. Kevin actually mapped out our route there and for most of the whole trip. I think he's really liking his new GPS. Kevin planned our route to MN by taking Hwy 33 and so he could go through Wildcat Mountain. As usual I let him lead through there since I do not take the sharp curves as fast as him. After Ontario we ran into a detour which took us all the way south through La Farge & Viroqua so from there we decided to head west and hit the Mississippi River in Genoa and then take Hwy 35 all the way to La Crosse along the Mississippi River and then over to the Minnesota side of the River into Winona. We had a very nice visit with Dad and Candy, although Dad wasn't very talkative but he said he was listening to our interesting conversations. Candy made us a nice stuffed chicken breast dinner our first night there and we got to meet Star. We stayed two nights in Winona before heading out towards St. Louis.

On Wednesday morning, June 25, we left Winona around 8:45 a.m., after a quick stop by Dad to say goodbye. Our game plan was to take the Great River Road as much as possible all the way to St. Louis whether it be west or east of the River and to at least make it to Quincy IL to spend the night before making the remainder of the way to St. Louis the next morning. We found some breath-taking views and over looks along the Iowa side of the River. We stopped in Clinton IA for lunch at a Jimmy John's before continuing on. At one point I almost ran out of gas because there were hardly any towns along a good portion of the Great River Road, but Kevin luckily found a gas station on the GPS not too far away which I barely made it to. From there we decided to stay on Hwy 61 since the Great River Road would eventually meet back up with it anyways. When we were near Quincy I decided to keep on going another 26 miles to Hannibal MO to lesson our trip the next day, even though I was extremely sore by this point. I think it was around 5:30 when we rolled into Hannibal and we found a Days Inn with an outdoor pool at a really cheap rate. However their water plant had been struck by lightening the night before so the whole town was under a water boil. Not the worst but it was a little awkward brushing our teeth with bottled water and the only bottled water left at the gas station was flavored. It felt oh so good to take a swim in the pool to rest our aching bodies.

The next morning we packed back up and headed out around 9ish. We took Hwy 79 along the Missouri side of the River down to Hwy 54 where we crossed over to the Illinois side hence I decided it would be better to hit St. Louis from the east side vs. going in from the west side because it would take us all the way through most of St. Louis and heavy traffic which we didn't need to do since our hotel and everything we were there to see was on the east side of town. Also it looked like the Great River Road on the east side kept closer along the River and it did with some spectacular rock formations just before Alton. I managed to take the wrong bridge across so we stopped at a gas station to get our bearings. Once I figured out how to get to the bridge we wanted we headed back out and I was able to get us back on the highway eventually in East St. Louis which took us across the River just blocks away from our hotel (The Sheraton). It was around noon when we checked in. Luckily for us the Cardinals were out of town and there wasn't anything big going so they upgraded us to a suite. After we freshened up we headed out via foot to the Gateway Arch. Since it was a week day it wasn't very busy and we were able to go with the next group up which was only a few minutes after arriving. We snapped some awesome pictures while up there and a couple in the Museum before leaving. Since we hadn't had ate any lunch we decided to stop for an early dinner for some BBQ, which I most definitely had to have while in Missouri. We decided on Joe Buck's BBQ joint downtown (Kevin's favorite NFL announcer, NOT!). My chicken was really good but our ribs were a little less than desirable. After that we headed back to the Sheraton and I took a good nap. Then we walked back downtown and took a horse carriage ride. From there we headed back towards Union Station by our hotel hoping to find the Edy's for some ice-cream but no luck so we just went back to the hotel and checked out the pool, which was very cold so we didn't go for a swim.

On Friday our plan was to tour the Anheuser Busch Brewery so we headed downtown and had breakfast at a Hardee's before taking a taxi because nobody at the Cardinals Nation Bar knew where or how to get on the trolley's we saw there yesterday that would take you to the Brewery. What I really wanted to see were the Clydesdales and would have loved to made it to Grant's Farm to see where they are raised but that was 50 miles away from downtown and we wanted to take a break from the bikes for the day, howver, they did have Clydesdales at the Brewery including some stables. After the tour Kevin had a beer and we picked out some shirts from the gift shop and then we found the trolley which would take us back to the Cardinals Nation Bar for free. We stopped in the bar for something to drink and then headed back towards our hotel while taking a detour to Union Station to check it out and see if we could find that Edy's but to no avail because it was no longer in the mall at Union Station. So we opted for the Hard Rock Cafe in Union Station where we both had some killer ice-cream desserts! We headed back to the hotel after that and took a nap while it rained. After napping we freshened up and headed back downtown to find Bailey's Range for some burgers recommended by Kevin's son Miles. They not only had the best burgers, but also the best selection of sodas, best homemade pickles and best sauces. My chipotle ketchup was kick-butt! From there we headed back to the hotel since it was getting kind of late. I noticed at night some of the buildings downtown had their columns lit up with rainbow spotlights (pictures above) because on Sunday they were supposed to have the big Pride Day festival. We were sure lucky and glad that our stay wasn't during any of that or other events because it gave us more freedom and less hassles. Oh and I forgot to mention that St. Louis is celebrating their 250th anniversary and they have 250 cakes located all over the city.

On Saturday June 28 we sadly left St. Louis but not before finding a spot downtown, which wasn't hard to do on a weekend morning, to take a picture of the bikes with the Arch in the background. Then we took the Stan Musial Veteran's Memorial Bridge back into Illinois. I stopped in Quincy to take some pictures of the Gardner Denver plant (one of our customer's facility's). Then we stopped in Nauvoo to stretch and for some lunch at Grandpa Paul's Diner. We decided to make our night's stay in Dubuque and we came up on some spectacular views just before making it into Dubuque. I have to say that if you're going to take the Great River Road I would suggest taking the West side down because the Illinois side did not offer much for scenery except around Dubuque and far south by Alton. When we arrived into Dubuque we couldn't find a hotel with vacancy and when we stopped at the third hotel we parked under their carport and luckily we did because minutes after we stopped it down poured, but let up just when we were ready to head back out. We found vacancy at the Canfield Inn which was probably a bustling place back in the sixties but now is very rustic and pretty filthy. We didn't even shower the next day and opted for heading out almost immediately after waking up to make the last leg of our trip home. I took Hwy 11 east out of Dubuque to Hwy 78 north. We stopped in Argyle WI to gas up for the last time and for some breakfast before making our way back on Hwy 78 north to Hwy 60 east and then Hwy 151 out of Columbus. We made it home around noon, tired, sore and so glad to be home. It was an awesome trip and we only saw three deer which were crossing the road far enough ahead to slow down for. The only casualty was a swallow that flew into my left boot when we were heading home in Illinois. We put in 1,490 miles this trip so I think we could probably call it an even 1,500!