At 168 miles, this is the longest day of our trip. It turned out to be an easier day than I had feared. The forecast was for headwinds all day, but the winds were reasonably light, the temperature was mild, and I joined a nice paceline to share the wind-blocking duties.

I rode with the contingent from Maryland (Greg and Elizabeth) and Virginia (Kim, David, Mike and

The scenery was very similar to yesterday's ride through Illinois - mostly farm land and trees with very few hills

Nancy) all day, with a few other folks joining us occasionally. We maintained a good pace of between 17 and 20 mph into the wind, and even with our dawdling at the rest and lunch stops, we still made it to the motel in Wabash before 5:00. Of course, we started the ride at 6:00AM this morning.

I took very few photos as we rode today because I didn't want to leave our paceline and risk fighting the

The map shows our progress across the country. We're getting pretty close to our destination

winds for miles on my own. The scenery was very similar to yesterday in Illinois.

The weather was just about perfect today. It started out a little cool, particularly since we left the motel just as the sun was breaking the horizon. But by the first rest stop, it had warmed up nicely to the upper 60's and didn't get that much warmer through the rest of the day. This is very unusual for this area of the country in August. On most of these tours, the cyclists are contending with temperatures in the 90's with humidity figures to match.