Back in the Midwest

You know you are back in the Midwest when the skies turn gloomy and it rains on and off all day long.  Such was the weather that greeted us all day today.

Last night's sleep was pretty quiet.  This rest area we stayed in has a separate parking area for "camping vehicles", so it was isolated from the truck lanes by some land and the restroom buildings. However, as it got later at night and the truck lanes filled up, the truckers just filled the camper lanes so it was like a mini truck area.  The ones near us didn't leave their engines run all night long so it was peaceful.

We were commenting as we were driving that it probably was beautiful country that we were driving through.  This was the Appalachian mountain range and just before it got pitch dark I could see that we were entering a fall color zone.  This morning we drove through more of these mountains and the colors probably would have been amazing if the sun was shining.  As it was, the fog and the grey day muted the colors considerably.  You just had to use your imagination.

We wanted to stop at New River Gorge National Park in West Virginia, since we were driving right by it, but we really didn't know what we would be doing in the pouring rain, so we drove on.  We'll have to catch that next time we're through here.

Stopped for lunch in a park in Chillicothe, Ohio.  Chillicothe is known for its Native American earthen mounds, however, there’s not much left to them and it was raining so we didn’t put forth much effort to go see them.

We were passing right through Dayton, so we stopped at the Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historic Park, where the Wright brothers did most of their work for their bicycle shop and their airplane development.  North Carolina may have the tagline “First in Flight”, but in reality, the Wright brothers did most of their work in Dayton, Ohio, and only went to North Carolina seeking large areas of sand (to soften the impact of crashes), steady wind, and privacy.  They didn’t want anyone else to know what they were doing.

We arrived around 3pm, the buildings closed at 4pm, so not a lot of time to check things out, but we did get in on a tour of The Wright Cycle Co., their fourth bike shop.  Mostly replicas and pictures, and the building was rescued from demolition after going through several owners, and then restored to its condition when the Wright brothers owned it.

This bike is a replica of one of the Wright Brothers own models, complete with wood rims.

Not much has changed in basic bicycle design since then.

Leaving there we continued working our way towards Fort Wayne, Indiana.  The landscape completely flattened out and the rain continued, and we knew we were back in the Midwest.

Stopped at a Culver’s in Fort Wayne and had a concrete mixer, something we haven’t had in six weeks.  They just don’t have ‘em in the south.

We drove north for another several miles and stopped for the night at a rest area along I-69.  We’ll stop at Shipshewana tomorrow at the Amish stores to load up on groceries before taking the final leg of the journey home.

472 miles covered today.  That's more than we usually cover in one day.