From Iowa to NC, Day 3: There’s stuff to do in…Kentucky??

I woke up, and immediately checked on the bike. Thankfully, all was well there, and it was still sitting outside where I'd left it.

Checking on the bike was followed immediately by checking the weather. It rained overnight again, and there were more storm warnings, once again, looking like the best time to head out was around noon. That's normally fine by me, but for some reason I was still waking up early, and wanted to make sure I made Deal's Gap Saturday afternoon, with it now being Friday.

As I'd never been through KY, I'd also done some research on what was worth seeing, and was surprised to see, quite a bit, actually - a cool underground lake like Carlsbad Caverns that you could take a raft through, some parks, Old Louisville, distilleries and breweries, a 'shopping trail' thing, and other random scenic and entertaining places. If I'd have had more time, I probably would have head out through Western Kentucky, then gone into Northern TN, but it wasn't a great idea with the lack of time I'd been making at this point, so I figured I'd go into Old Louisville, and then head on to Bardstown, see a brewery, then cut across some back roads for an entertaining ride versus the highways for a bit.

With the rain and forecast, instead, I wound up having the continental breakfast, lots of OJ (yum!), then checking out but asking if I could leave my tailbag there while I ran to Wal-Mart for a charger for the phone. I did have the Powerlet, with a car lighter adapter, just no charger, and I get slightly paranoid being in the middle of nowhere without at least a cell phone, 'just in case' it winds up being needed.

The GPS did manage to get me to Wal-Mart.  I literally don’t shop there, ever, when home(corporate welfare while we pay for their employees health and other things - solely on Wal-Mart itself, not the employees who need to work..somewhere), but when traveling, you wind up having to go where you go..  

It was pretty useful for finding lodging, food, entertainment, plus I'd plugged in a list of all Suzuki dealers nationwide - POIs and custom POIs are great. I walked in, and couldn't find what I wanted, so asked some guy working there, who showed me a generic and huge power adapter, after I speciifcially said, 'you know, like an iPod charger.' This thing was a brick, but there didn't seem to be anything else. I thanked him, but figured there must be something else. I was about to give up, and buy the brick, when a girl working there asked if she could help. She immediately points out what I was looking for, at half the price, and 1/5th the size of the other charger. Yay!

Destination: Louisville, Kentucky

Heading back to the bike, and packing stuff, including this time, Gatorade for the CamelBak, an older guy looking like 75 or so was parked next to me, and he made a comment about the price of gas, gas mileage etc, as he pointed to the bike. I told him it's not too late to start riding as long as he could see, mostly joking..turns out he's 82, but thankfully, drives better than most blue haired Floridian retirees I've seen. I waved and went back to the hotel, packed up the bike, and headed out. Destination - Old Louisville, or thereabouts, then on to Bardstown.

The weather was OK. A few drops of rain here and there, but much lower wind, I had a working phone/MP3 player again, and all was well. I was adjusting to the bike slowly, but sadly all highway miles. A few hours later, unfortunately, it was a 'heat warning' as temperatures went up to right around 100*F.

It wasn't terrible, like when sitting at a stop light on a bike in gear, and you just drip sweat from everywhere, and air flows through my mesh gear pretty well, but it still tends to drain you a bit over time.

I remembered a friend of mine's wife was about to be due, and while I'd told him to call me if she gave birth, I figured it was probably time for a stop, and to check in, so I stopped at a rest area. NOW I was really feeling the heat...grabbed some cold water, called my buddy to find out she hadn't given birth yet, and realizing I was at the border of KY, went inside to ask the guy at the desk ('Information Clerk?' :-) ) if there was anything I 'must see.'

I asked him about time to make it to Louisville, then Knoxville, which was my unofficial planned destination for the night, as well as Bardstown en route. He had lots of ideas for places in Western KY, but they were too far off where I needed to make it to, although there was an old fort or something that sounded like it had great roads in and out of it, and he convinced me that I'd likely make Bardstown while the breweries were closing up at this point, and also said it wasn't worth visiting Old Louisville. Old Louisville is basically just a historic section of Louisville, that I picked out semi-randomly as a destination, as I like old buildings, and figured I'd stop and just take a few pictures.

Back on the road again, the heat stayed up there, and Louisville came into sight. Sometimes you sort of get a feeling about a place when you come up on it, whether it makes sense or not, but it looked like a pretty cool place to me. I check the time, thinking about detouring to Old Louisville anyways, but realize it's coming up on rush hour traffic, or whatever passes for it, so I decide against it.

I go over a bridge right next to Louisville, and traffic is pretty bad..it took 30 minutes or so to make it over the bridge. Not quite slowly enough that I could manage to get my camera out easily, but quite slow enough, considering the heat. I manage to try to take some pics from on the bridge, one of which managed to be of the ground for some unknown reason...possibly something to do with trying to not drop the camera or glove now off my hand, while having to nudge forward to not annoy people behind me...?

Something big, multiple times. I thought it was bizarre hail for a second, but as I get hit fairly hard on my right knee, I see guts on my knee. Nice - giant locusts, or Cicadas (sp?), which are apparently over-running KY or something. They're huge, and their guts are added to the 'collection' on the front of the bike, and on me, but I pass through them within a half mile. Bizarre.

I pull into a rest area again not far down, to re-hydrate and glance at weather reports. An older guy and his girlfriend or wife come in behind me, on a 'SilverWing,' which is sort of like a Goldwing, but a scooter, with trunk and all. Apparently they were also dive-bombed by the Cicadas. That SilverWing also apparently does 85MPH+ on the highway. Not for me, but it's sort of a bike, anyways. No gear on either of them besides a half helmet, which always makes me feel a bit odd to see, but nice people, nonetheless.

Welcome to Hell 

Another road actually joined with the highway I was on, all running into a pair of lanes. People's cars were overheating. I was so glad I had my CamelBak, as I felt like I was being roasted over a not so distant flame. I de-geared a bit, gloves off, modular helmet flipped up, and jacket halfway un-zipped, while sucking down my Fierce Grape Gatorade like it was the nectar of life. I made a phone call or two, and realized the SV is at least fairly light, can balance it well all the way down to 0MPH for a second or more, when the car in front of you persists in not moving when they should be.

After the second hour, there just wasn't any end in sight, just cars as far as you could see. I lane split for a while at low speeds, until a pair of tractor trailers were next to each other, and with the narrow road, their distance was less than, or right at my handlebar width, so I decided to take it as a sign and stop doing that one for a bit. More overheated cars.

At the end of it, there were a pair of ambulances, as apparently people were now, besides being utterly pissed off, also getting heat exhaustion, including some who ran out of gas in the traffic jam, then lost AC.. 

No real surprise there, and no fun for anyone.  I still had some fluid in my Camelbak, but that heat was just draining. 

I relaxed and de-stressed a bit, and hung out for around an hour. It managed to get late by now, around 10:30pm or so, and of course, the rain came back for a bit as I was pulling out of the lot. I figured I was going to go until I couldn't, but wasn't going to worry about making Knoxville tonight - it wasn't out of the question, but it would be what would be..as long as I made it somewhere within an hour or two from Knoxville, no worries, I'd be at Deal's Gap by noon or so on Saturday, and if it was a bit later, so be it.