Riding on the US highway turned out to be a very good call... the shoulders are so generous they're practically bike lanes, and very smooth and clean. I made excellent time, and good music on the radio made up for the traffic noise. As soon as I got out of the Missouri River valley, I got incredible radio reception. I was picking up weather reports from so far away I had trouble believing they were talking about the same day... apparently Columbia was having severe thunderstorms and a tornado warning, while I had a clear sky and 80 degree temperatures. Everything was great until I got near Lake of the Ozarks, which is a real vacation town, like a sprawling suburb with no urban area nearby. Not friendly to cyclists, and the campground I stopped at was not friendly to tenters, but by the time I stopped I had no choice. I fumed about it for a while but got over it at last.

44.6 mi