DAY 40 ~ 10/24/21

Joan wanted to take the first 2 or so hours off this morning so I set out alone. I’ve done this many times before, but for some reason this morning, not even a half mile into the route, the street came to a dead end and the turn options didn’t match my day planned route list. I tried to use Google maps but it didn’t recognize the names I was putting in. I called Joan. No answer. I called Clarence no answer. We did have cell service too because I was in town. I tried Google again with no luck and truly felt lost for the first time. I tried calling Joan and Clarence another time and again no answer. Then I decided to try Paige. She answered and was able to see my location and help me get where I needed to go. The problem she said was that there were two Highway 67s. What the heck!?!! Then getting through downtown, I got lost again. The street signs were either missing, labeled wrong or with different names. I called Paige again and she got me right on track. I actually had to call her two more times even after that! She answered each time even though she was at the Packer football game! I truly don’t know what I would’ve done without her today.

I figure all of the issues from this navigation nightmare cost me a mile + in extra steps.

I passed a cemetery just outside of Fredericktown and noticed a large tall tombstone with a very small folded up confederate flag resting on one of its ledges. The tombstone read “In memory of Confederate soldiers killed in battle at Fredericktown October 21, 1861. What a chilling site!!

A man stopped and asked if I was from around here because he was lost. I felt so bad that I couldn’t help him but I could totally relate. This was a very hard area to navigate through!!

When Joan wanted to join me at around 11:30, they set out to find me. Even though by that time I had only walked 8.5 miles out of town, it took them a half hour to do so. I gave them business names and house addresses as I passed them. Clarence said none of them were recognized by google. When he finally figured it out he said that there were actually three Highway 67s!! Triple what the heck?!?!!

They felt bad about not being able to answer my calls. They didn’t take their phones with them when they went into a coffee shop right after they dropped me off and were without them for about 15 minutes. One wouldn’t think I would need them in the first 15 minutes, right?

While I was walking alone this morning they did some shopping at Walmart. They said a woman came up to the RV and noticed the sign. She told them that her husband was diagnosed just two weeks ago with pulmonary fibrosis. They talked to her about what I’m doing and she was so moved she donated a $20 bill on the spot. Makes every step I take so worth it!

I did a total of 16 miles today. Joan joined me for just under 7 of those miles.

It got up to 80° this afternoon. We’ve had cooler temps so I wore the wrong thing and was really hot most of the day.

Thank goodness tomorrow brings us to a new RV park, hopefully with cell service. And I’m really looking forward to the next 4 days only being roughly 13 miles each!! It’s been a long stretch of 15+ mile days waking up and down these very hilly roads!!

As if there wasn’t enough energy expelled from all the excitement in one day, my phone’s s alert system went off at 8:20 leaving a message that there was a tornado warning in our area until 9pm. It went off again extending the warning 15 more minutes until 9:15. We strapped into our seatbelts. Joan in the passenger seat. Clarence in the driver seat. And me in her bed strapped into the dining room bench seatbelt. We brought in the pop outs. We waited. Minutes seemed like hours. Thank goodness we escaped without any harm. It was very scary not having any place to go. No shelter. No cell service. On the radio later, they were describing all the damage. Was alarming to hear it was in places we just walked!! A house destroyed with the people who live there missing on highway F. I sure hope it wasn’t Marlene with the dogs who offered us a ride!!! Highway OO was closed. On our ride to our starting point this morning we saw tons of devastation and damage. Roofs off of homes, trees down powerlines down, debris strewn all over and hanging from trees, a motorhome on the road. Was 5 to 10 miles from where we were last night. Holy Toledo we got lucky!This adventure never ceases to amaze me!!