Phase 4, Day 5. Cambria, IL-Princeton, IN

103 miles.  A pretty casual day at just under 6 hours on the bike. 

Navigation sure was easy.  The first turn?  Mile 68.  Counties changed names twice, the road changed names many times but still on the same dead-straight strip of road watching the corn grow for 4 hours. I've never been so excited to make a turn before. 

Actually, I did swing into West Salem for a sandwich.  A nice little town with neat and tidy houses but all the stores were shut. The downtown plaza was a ghost town and all the businesses had boarded up and gone years ago.  It was eerie. Still looking for my sandwich I stopped to talk a man working in his front garden. "Where did everyone go?" He said they all were run out of business when Walmart opened 20 miles down the road in Princeton...except the grocer.  He's in jail for selling meth laced cookies. I decided to forget about the sandwich.

It was the same scene today as yesterday only slightly hillier. Very pretty. Started a bit wet (hunkered down under a church awning to get out of one shower..lots and lots of churches around) but it soon dried out and warmed up.

Southern Illinois is bordered to its west by the Mississippi River and the east the Wabash River. The rivers join at the south end of the state. I eventually crossed the Wabash River and rolled into Indiana and very soon Princeton, home to a Toyota assembly plant and this town's largest employer. Perhaps it's just this particular town, I'm not sure, but the locals here seem VERY different than on the other side of the Wabash. Face piercings, missing teeth and XXXL t-shirts are all in vogue in Princeton. All I've seen so far are strip malls, fast food joints....and, oh yes, Walmart.

Tomorrow we will see if Princeton is an anomaly as we ride to Tell City, IN on the Ohio River. Tomorrow is the short day of the week at 70 miles. I think I'll bug out of Princeton early and then have time to check out Tell City...might be better.