This is long...but it was a long ride (for a commute).

I had to go to Jeff City today (30 miles away) because I agreed to do the Missouri Bicycle & Pedestrian Federation booth during the Conservation Day at the Capitol. I didn't want to take the car, because my husband & daughter get out of school at 3, and I was going to be in Jeff City for most of the afternoon. (They don't bike. It's really their car.)

So I left at 7:30 and biked. It was cold! I started to wonder if I'd made a mistake because my hands just wouldn't warm up. I had my heavy gloves on but not the mitten shells. But they finally kicked in after the 3rd hill or so.

There is a lovely rail-trail between Columbia and Jeff City, the Katy Trail. There's another route using the quieter highways. But I took the main highway, Hwy 63, because it's the most direct route. 30 miles, versus 37 on the quiet highways, or 40 on the Katy.

On my work horse of a bike, 10 miles is a difference of an hour. But Hwy 63 between Columbia & Jeff is awfully busy and scary. It's not an interstate but pretty close to that. I've ridden it before, but that was early on a Sunday morning. I had work week traffic.

It was actually a pretty decent ride. The shoulders are SO wide--quite a novelty in shoulder-deficient Missouri. They were in good condition. And they were clean. A bit of road kill or litter here and there, but I wasn't constantly dodging debris and potholes.

I had my route all worked out, but for some reason I hadn't thought about the bridge. There is only one bridge over the Missouri River into Jeff. It has a bike lane--on the other side only. (Whose idea was that, anyway?) I've ridden that bike lane wrong-way before, which is how it is supposed to be ridden, but I hated it so much, that I just do what everyone else does, and ride on the highway across the bridge. Of course you lose the shoulder too on the bridge.

The worst part of the bridge though is that it is a bridge. I'm scared of heights, especially over water. I don't know why. I'm fine in a boat. Even in a car crossing a bridge I get nervous. This bridge is SO high, and with 60 and 70 mph traffic, it is really terrifying.

Somehow I'd managed to forget about that until a few miles away. I was absolutely gripped in panic! I took some deep breaths and focused on some other thoughts (anything else--just not that bridge!) until I got to the bridge. I kept my head down and kept my eyes focused as close in front of me as I could without actually not looking at the road!

Because once you get on that bridge, there is nothing you can do. The cars will hit you or not, and they are going so fast it's out of your control. So I just do my best to absolutely ignore them on my left side, and the water on my right side. I think there might have been a lot of ice in the water because it was easy to pretend it was concrete. I didn't look too closely.

Now, getting through Jeff City was another matter. Wow, does that town have hills! Just outside of Jeff I was pleased with how good time I'd made and anticipated getting to the U-haul rental 15 minutes earlier than I'd thought. I thought it would take me half an hour to get through town. It took me the half hour PLUS the 15 minutes I'd banked.

I wanted to ride home, but I also wanted to spend some time with my family today, so I rode about 10 miles out of Jeff until my husband got out of class and found me on the highway, and we pulled over and loaded the bike on the car and went home.