St. Louis

Today we rode 60 miles from Union to St. Louis and had a police escort for 30 of those miles. We woke up at 6 AM and and quickly packed and headed out to breakfast. This morning was a real treat because had breakfast cooked for us, which meant no cup of cereal and half a bagel. Everyone enjoyed eggs, bacon, sausage, and fresh donuts that were cooked on site and really hit the spot.

Breakfast at Union High School

We got on the road about 7:20 and were told we had to be at mile 30 where the police escort began by 9, which meant we would really have to move to get there. At 9:01 we hit 33 miles where the police escort was waiting for us, and we had some down time while we waited for the rest of the pace lines to arrive.

The first police escort was a St. Louis County officer who escorted us for 20 miles into the outskirts of the city, where he handed us off to the St. Louis Metropolitan escorts who took us the rest of the way into the city. We arrived for lunch at Forest Park a very nice downtown park area where lunch was sponsored by a team members mom.

Lunch at a golf course in Forest Park

After lunch we had time for a quick nap and then got back on the bikes for our 2 PM arrival down town. Our final escort took us into the heart of the city and with two officers we were able to blow through lights and make the arrival quick. The St. Louis Arch, the gateway to the west and the state building made for a gorgeous backdrop for the reading of the mayors proclamation declaring July 24, 2009 Push America day in St. Louis.

Arrival

We rode a few blocks to our hotel which was provided by our generous sponsors and then cleaned up and ran to a bike shop where I had my rear wheel trued. It was another amazing day on the Journey of Hope and excited about a day off to explore St. Louis tomorrow.

Some very cool news about the Garmin is that I found free program that allows me to upload my rides to the internet so everyone can see them and if other cyclist wanted to try the ride they could download it to their computer, Very Cool!