Our camp at Sam A. Baker State Park

Day 10 - It sounded like it started to rain during the night, but it just turned out to be dew dripping off of the trees. It continued all night and by morning we were as wet as we were after all the precipitation at Johnson's Shut-Ins! It was a morning of dryng our gear again. As a result, we did not leave the campground until 11:00 AM. Fortunately, the creek we had to cross yesterday with the bike was gone, so it made leaving the campground easier, but the hills heading east were still there and this time we were pedaling a loaded bike, so it was much slower traveling than yesterday. Things got much easier when we started heading south on Hwy 49 with the road paralleling a railroad track. We began to make good time on the level road. When we reached Annapolis, MO. we stopped for lunch at a cafe with an open dining room and everyone starred at the way we were dressed for Sunday dining in our tight biking shorts! We continued to have easy traveling until we reached Des Arc, MO. and started heading east on Hwy 143. We started climbing again and the next 10 miles took us nearly 1 1/2 hours. The streams and creeks that we crossed have amazingly clear water that allow us to see the riverbed easily and all the aquatic life. This is especially surprising after all the rain we have had here lately. Around Higginsville when it rains all the streams and creeks get even muddier. We reached Sam A. Baker State Park before 5:00 PM and set up camp in Campground #2 which proved to be a mistake because later we learned that the showers had no hot water. We ended up walking 1 1/2 miles to Campground #1 to have a hot shower. Before that we spent the afternoon touring the Park by bike and visited the St. Francis River that flows through it. We got to bed before 9:00 PM under very clear skies again. We covered over 41 miles today which includes 1 1/2 miles pedaling around the Park after we reached our campsite. We averaged a surprising 10.4 mi/hr and our maximum speed was an exciting 42 mi/hr!