Day 40, September 3: the United States of Corn

Angola, IN to Fremont, OH http://cyclemeter.com/85ef50859d8f1e5c/Cycle-20150903-0651
Trip distance: 118.7 miles - fourth century ride of the trip
Total trip distance: 2323.5 miles
Average speed: 14.2 mph
Maximum speed: 25.8 mph
Riding time: 8:18
Weather: once again rain was forecast for the afternoon so I started pretty early – 6:45 am. The temperature was a warm 73° and the dew point was 68°. Temperatures stayed relatively cool in the morning because of cloudiness but got to the low 90s in the afternoon with accompanying dew points in the low 70s. No wind until about 10:30 am when it started blowing mainly from the WSW anywhere from 2 to 8 mph. It was more tailwind than crosswind.

Terrain: uphill 1199 feet, downhill 1573. I elongated the route profile below to emphasize that it was a long flat day. The overall trend was downward because the route began inland and ended close to where the Sandusky River empties into Lake Erie.

My route went about 119 miles through farmlands in Indiana and Ohio. More often than not it went through cornfields. I think our country could be called the United States of Corn. The route was so long that I divided it into two maps--see below.

Today's ride was my longest since South Dakota. Several things came together to make this happen. I got an early start. Route navigation was simple for the most part. I didn't have to climb many hills. If you divide the climbing by total miles, on average I climbed less than 12 feet per mile. This was probably my flattest day. The Raisz landform map below shows that much of my route crossed the lake bed of Glacial Lake Maumee, an ancestor of present-day Lake Erie. Finally, a modest tailwind helped me ride a longer distance than usual.

The star shows my starting point in Angola, IN and I finished in Fremont, OH, which is underlined.

Another significant feature of my route was evidence of the rectangular grid of the Public Land Survey System, which the federal government devised for organizing land for sale and settling. The land was divided into square mile sections, and roads were built on these section lines. A screen capture of part of my route map in satellite view shows the one-mile squares.

The one-mile squares of the Public Land Survey System are clearly visible in this screen capture of part of my route.

My ride began with me heading toward a thunderstorm, something that was disconcerting as I saw two bolts of lightning a few minutes into my ride, but my phone showed the storm to be more than 20 miles ahead of me and moving out of my way.

A small thunderstorm ahead of me blocked the sunrise, but as the storm clouds thinned out some sunrise color became visible.

Early morning mist, with some cows in the left background.

Early morning mist.

By 9:30 the sun burned off the mist. By now I had left the moraine hills and entered the very flat Lake Maumee plain. The active Williams County Landfill rises above the plain.

Corn fields in the Glacial Lake Maumee plain.

In some places the plain is so flat that farmers need to make ditches to drain their fields.

Asgrow "Competitor" soybeans and corn.

I saw several dozen pond created for recreational use, and most of them had rock shorelines and sometimes a sandy segment of shoreline for swimming.

This pond looks like it has "bluing" in it. Tractorsupply.com says that "Midnite Blue Lake and Pond Colorant give your watering hole a vibrant, but not artificial, look."

Old fashioned but very effective energy conservation. The road goes straight south showing that someone planted evergreens on the northwest side of the farmhouse, thereby reducing the impact of cold winter winds.

Old fashioned energy conservation, part 2. Here's a view of the house in the previous photo from the south. The leaf trees provide shade in the summer and allow the sun to warm the house in the winter.

The very wide Maumee River goes through the middle of the Maumee plain. The Maumee River watershed is Ohio's Breadbasket, according to Wikipedia.

The Henry County Courthouse in Napoleon, OH. Napoleon is on the Maumee River. The city grew because of its location on the
Miami and Erie Canal and by supplying products to farmers in the surrounding area.

The Sandusky County Courthouse in Fremont, OH--not as impressive as Napoleon County's. Rutherford Hayes lived in Fremont for a time. The Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center, the first presidential library in the United States, is here.

Here's a closer look at the sculpture in the previous photo. I don't know what it is, but I like it.