St. Joseph

We waited out the morning thunderstorms before starting our ride in what quickly turned out to be another fantastic day. About 10 miles out of Platte City we passed the McCormick Distillery. As part of our Tour de Café we stopped in the nearby town of Weston for our first coffee break. The walls of the café were covered with vintage motorcycle photos and our waitress told us that the café hosts a biker breakfast every Thursday. While this seemed out of character for Weston’s quaint historic district, she said it is a wonderful event. We also met more nice folks in the café and a young couple told us that they drove to Weston just to tour the distillery. Unfortunately, the distillery stopped giving public tours.

Leaving Weston we dropped to the flat river bottom roads that were wonderfully flat all the way to St. Joseph. Jeff and Joe decided to cross the Missouri River to Atchison, Kansas to visit the birthplace of Amelia Earhart. In support of the Tour de Café they stopped at another café before leaving town. HP stayed in Missouri and also supported the Tour by stopping at the Broken Spoke Café where he met Lorene Goodpasture, a local writer who was interested in his journey. She is 88 years old and has a sister that is 90. Even though she is vision impaired, she still writes for the local newspaper and has published several books. She gave 2 of her books to HP: (1) The Historical Legends of Iatan and (2) A Patchwork of Country Roads.

Joe claims that St. Joseph is named after him for his saintly behavior. We will let his family decide if this is true. St. Joseph is “where the Pony Express started and Jesse James ended.” On July 6, 1804, Lewis and Clark camped in what is now the downtown. On May 8th, Joe, HP, and Jeff cycled into the city looking for Lewis and Clark’s campground but ended up staying in the Riverfront Holiday Inn. Lewis and Clark never had it so good. We have carried our tents but they still are unused. Soon we will be beyond the comforts of city living and campgrounds will be the norm.

Our arrival into St. Joseph had 2 surprises. First we were met by a local television reporter that filmed our arrival and interview HP about his journeys in the United States. The second was that Leo and Sue, who saw us off from Chicago, also met us at our hotel.

Most importantly, this trip has aged Jeff. Today he celebrates his birthday!

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