Hot! Hot! Hot!

On Friday, Dan Pfaff and I rode our July populaire permanent, the Marshfield Mash 112K. It was an evening (17:00) start again, and it was hot: still 97 degrees, only one degree below the record high set in 1931. The wind was out of the south to SSE at about 10 miles per hour, which did not help us much until we headed north out of Rogersville. The tall trees along White Oak Road and KK Highway also provided some shade. At the intersection of KK Highway and PP Highway, there was a barricade saying KK Highway was closed a mile further. We rode on, and MoDOT had been working on the bridge over Panther Creek, but the bridge was open. We made it to Marshfield at about 20:50. We were almost back to Panther Creek before it really got dark, although we had our lights on since we turned on to KK Highway. As we were riding down a hill on White Oak Road, I experience a weird effect of seeming to be falling into a bottomless pit. The road surface was very uniform with no center broken line, and there was tall vegetation growing right up to the edge of the road. It was apparent that the vegetation was moving, but the road did not seem to be moving at all. Very disorienting and weird. We made it back to Springfield a few minutes before 23:00. It was still 82 degrees.

White barn on KK Highway

Dan heading east on KK Highway

Red barn on A Highway south of Marshfield