Saturday, September 18, 2010

Day 10 - Prichard, MS to Rosedale, MS

The sun was rising over wide cotton fields loaded with cotton balls as we left our Tunica, MS hotel in the van.  We drove back to Prichard to continue our southward pedaling.  Straight and flat asphalt took us through miles of farm fields.  We saw mostly soybeans and cotton crops.  Many farmers seemed to be using beans that were not RoundupReady, because there were lots of weeds in many of the fields. 

We modified our route when our first scheduled turn was on to a road we discovered was gravel.  As we passed it, I snapped a picture of the Blue and White Restaurant where we had dined the previous evening.  It was the last restaurant we would see for many miles.

We spent some time on old US 61.  Illinois is not at all flat compared to this Mississippi delta land.

At one point we were forced off the road by a covey of GREEN cotton pickers and cotton wagons. Apparently I had my "invisible" shirt on, because a few moments later we were again forced off the road by a truck trying to pass the pickers.

All the functioning cotton pickers we saw were green.  Deere & Co. seems to dominate in this area.

We rested and refueled in the little town of Lula.  We got the sense in these bergs that the work force is significantly greater than the number of jobs available; they seemed considerably diminished from their earlier glory.

Pushing on, we passed a beautiful lake to the west; it appeared to be  river backwater lake and had beautiful cypress trees lining its banks.

We finished the day working on a 57 mile stretch on MS-1 into Rosedale.  It is nearly level, straight road.  There are slight grades that are more noticeable in the leg muscles than by eye.  There was a variable headwind that prompted several of the guys to ride in a pace line. 

To break the ride up we rested and refueled again in the little town of Sherrard, MS.  The temperature was in the low 90s and the sun fierce, but the humidity was relatively low, with the dew point in the low 50s.  During our stop, we me another solitary bicycle rider who was doing it the hard way.  He was pulling a little trailer with apparently all he owned.  The trailer apparently weighs about 60 pounds.  His derailleur had broken and he was stuck in a single gear, luckily a relatively low one.  He had traveled north out of California into Washington and Oregon, across the northern tier of states through Ohio and Pennsylvania and was now headed for the Gulf of Mexico.  He plans to spend the winter in Texas and hopes to find work there so he can get a new bicycle for his return trip to California.  He quipped about his trip, "It sure beats sitting around with no work".

Little was left in this town, but the municipal office shown here and some Habitat for Humanity built homes shown in the background.

We biked a total of 85 miles on Day 10, ending in Rosedale, MS,  and we learned how very flat the Mississippi delta country is.  When we could find no ice cream in Rosedale, we departed in the van for out Comfort Inn in Cleveland, MS.

No comments:

Post a Comment