Fijis Across America 2010

If you want to be truly happy, you won’t find it on an endless quest for more stuff. You’ll find it in receiving God’s generosity and in passing that generosity along. 

http://www.mapmyride.com/ride/united-states/mo/hartville/792126480545139399

We said our farewells to Mike as we awoke on the front lawn of the Hartville Courthouse packed up our belongings and headed out to reach Eminence. The morning if I remember correctly was unusual compared to the past mornings being cloudy with many hanging nimbostratus clouds. Nimbostratus clouds are a sure indication of rain, something we have yet to experience on this journey. And thankfully it never came during the entire day’s route. Today was actually quite rough. The Missouri hills seemed a little bit more sinister-like as if we were riding on the back of a demoniac dragon. Speaking of dragons, we met a lady at the Trails End restaurant at about mile 60 who energetically referred to herself as the Dragon Lady due to the fact she housed a large dragon statue in the front of her yard. It was an interesting lunch but the food outweighed the old timers conversation by far. Homemade onion rings, burgers, and fries…couldn’t be pleasing anymore. Congrats to Chaz and Tyler for beating me and Jordan in some billiards. I want a rematch and a new partner. Sorry Jordan. 

Lunch seemed like it was forever, but we eventually left and completed the remaining 20 miles. Talking about steepness. These Ozark Mountains show no mercy at all. One hill after climbing out of the campground bottoms seemed to never quit its 8 percents ascents. It was a beast. Once we arrived in the campground I was actually exhausted for once, but the good only got better. As soon as the back end of the trailer was propped downward, I carefully looked for one of my tupperware containers that contained the majority of my camp clothes and toiletries, but came up empty handed. A couple seconds later, I heard Chaz saying„„”Where’s my container as well?”. Our eyes grew to the size of grapefruits in a puzzled arrangement….WHAT HAPPENED!

Well, it turned out that earlier in the day, Jordan AND Tyler forgot to latch the back of the trailer door. As the story was told by Jordan, they descended down a hill after SAG #2 for the day and the back end fell down„,launching me and Chaz’s bin down the road. The two after some considerable time stopped in the middle of the road, jumped out of the Burb and closed the door. However, they forgot one important part—-Turn around and look if anything else fell out. Unfortunately, after rushing back to the position and searching for about an hour, which consisted of asking many residents near the road, our bins were officially missing for good. I had lost nearly $600 dollars worth of gear including my Patagonia fleece jacket, orange crocs, and some other technical hiking gear not leaving out shirts, pants, and toiletries. However, Chaz had it much worse and lost everything..all of his clothes, I still had a few leftover in my second bin. I will never forget the expression left on Chaz’s face as he said on our way to Walmart to purchase some clothes—-I have nothing, I’m homeless. It was comical and we tried to be good sports about the events that just progressed. In fact, clothes were just clothes, it could have something much more major that could have not been replaced so easily. 

Even through all the things we lost, me and Chaz managed to still have some fun out of the situation and purchased matching raccoon Mario t-shirts at Walmart

which brought huge smiles across our faces. It truly made my day.  Irritated, amused, and appreciated we arrived back at the campground in Eminence. We were kindly greeted by the other guys and they offered some of their personal clothes on their behalf if need be. Thanks guys.  After taking a dip in the creek behind the campsite me and Chaz retired for the night in our awesome matching t-shirts in hopes for a better day tomorrow.