Sunday, May 26th – Day 54 – Rest day in Springfield

Best part of the day:     Meeting up with our BTUSFMS friend, Mike Tipton

Worst part of the day:  Not quite a rest day

Distance: 0 miles           Riding Time: 0hrs 0min

Bed count: 34                 Sleeping Bag count: 20

Old habits die hard. Trying to sleep in on a rest day is not the easiest thing when you’re riding 5-6 days/week and wanting to get an decent early start. Our hosts said that it thundered last night, but, we didn’t hear a thing!! I guess we were really knocked out!

Our plan today was to hook up with our 2017 Bike The US For MS Pacific Coast teammate, Mike Tipton. He was up here in Springfield with friends to attend dirt-track motorcycle races held here annually on Memorial Day weekend. He had some time this morning to reconnect after having breakfast with his friends and before the races started. He would take us to the Lincoln Tomb and the Lincoln Presidential Museum.

Our host, Christine, fixed us up a nice scrambled eggs and English muffin with coffee and OJ breakfast. Mike came by around 8:45 to pick us up. Karl and Christine were going to a matinee movie and would be able to pick us up around 4.

So, off Mike and the two of us went first to Lincoln’s Tomb.

Mike had been there before and told us of the story where there was a plot to steal Lincoln’s body and ransom it off! The plot was thwarted in mid-execution by the U.S. Secret Service (an agency which Lincoln created, but, not originally as a protection agency!). Lincoln’s coffin is buried underneath 10’ of concrete inside the tomb. 

The remains of his wife, Mary, as well as 3 sons, Eddie, Willie and Tad, are also there in the tomb. The fourth son, Robert, is buried in Arlington.

Outside, there’s a large bust of Lincoln where you could rub his nose, supposedly for good luck!!

Next, Mike drove us to the State Capital Building where we took a tour. It was very informative. The building has been in existence since 1823 (I think). It has the tallest dome of any U.S. state capital building. What was thought to be a 25-minute tour wound up being about 45 minutes.

Outside of the Capital building, looking up at the underside of the dome from the ground floor, a close-up of the dome, part of the circular depiction of Springfield’s evolution starting with foriegners and the native peoples.)

When leaving the building, we saw that it had rained and was still a light drizzle. Lastly, he drove us to the Lincoln Presidential Museum. There was a new statue there and he hopped out so that we could get a look at it.

We said our goodbyes and headed into the museum.

(Mannequins of the Lincoln family in the museums central area. Note only 3 sons. Son, Eddie, died at age 3 due to tuberculosis. This is the most photographed place in the museum.)

Karl and Christine had a membership to the museum and let us use their card which saved us about $35! Karl had said that we could spend anywhere from 2½-3½ hours there. There were two theaters and a number of exhibits which followed Lincoln from his boyhood to his assassination and return to Springfield for his final resting place (and that attempted body snatching).

The museum had a Subway restaurant inside and we stopped in there for a lunch break. We also took the time to check for a Warm Showers host in Bloomington, tomorrow’s overnight stop. Our first hosting request proved fruitful thankfully.

A little before 4, we let Karl and Christine know that we were ready for pick up if their movie had finished. They came by shortly after and back home we went. A lot of walking today and not too much rest as it were.

For dinner tonight, Christine cooked up some Brats on toasted hoagie buns, with baked beans and corn on the cob. Very tastsy! A Riesling was also enjoyed by all! Ice cream for dessert preceded and a couple of games of Jenga downstairs. The blocks were cut and sanded foot-long 2x4s!! That made for another hour of good fun and conversation.(Trying, impossibly, to keep Beau from having his tail whack our “tower”!)

(The rascal, but, loving Beau!)

The forecast for tomorrow morning? A possible thunderstorm. We’ll have to wait it out until later that morning before we’re able to get rolling. We’ll check the radar again when we get up.

As said earlier, we’re off to Bloomington and another Warm Showers host. Looking ahead, we’re thinking that we’ve got only two more ride days in between tomorrow and our last day’s ride to Chicago! What started looking so far way, Chicago is now just days away!

Until our next post….