July 15, 2025
Day 9 - ending at Karnak, IL
Today is the day I get to meet Jeff Lee and ride on the Tunnel Hill Trail some with him. We'd arranged to meet at the furthest south Harrisburg Trailhead at 6:30am. The alarm on my phone was set for 4:00am. I woke up at 3:45am thinking I had to overslept. At 5:15am I went to the motel entryway area for breakfast.
I left the motel at 6:11am for our meet-up. I was a few minutes early, but Jeff was already there. I thought we'd be riding right away, but Jeff had questions about my bike first, and then we talked a little more before we took off. Jeff slowed his pace so that we could ride side by side. We had so many conversations on so many topics. One discussion led right to another. Needless to say, the time and the miles rolled away.
We hadn't seen any bicyclists after we'd left Harrisburg, but we did come across a fellow walking with a guitar. That seemed unusual to me, so I stopped to ask if I could get a picture. Stephen agreed. His guitar is missing some strings and he was headed to town to get them.
Jeff told me that Sandburn Junction was where he was thinking he would turn around. That would be just past the tunnel, or about 24 miles one-way riding for Jeff. Whatever mileage he did one way would be doubled as he'd need to ride back to his car.
Jeff was thoughtfully accommodating - he'd stop whenever I wanted to take a picture or catch my breath. He even switched sides right/left on the trail to give me whichever side had the smoothest path.
We arrived in Tunnel Hill, a town next to the tunnel at 10:18am. The tunnel was next. We could feel the cool air from the tunnel before we saw the entrance. The tunnel isn't that long, but we both used headlights to see to get through.
I had originally planned to camp at Sandburg Junction, which was just ahead. I think it's a unique place because it's a self-serve business that has all the things a bicyclist would want for a break. I checked out what I thought was the camping area. It appeared to be just a mowed field beside the building. Well I'm not staying here anyway now, I'm heading on to Main Brothers Campground in Karnak at the south end of the trail. I thought Jeff was going to turn around here, but he decided he was up to continuing on to Vienna, where we could eat lunch together. So we had nine more miles of conversation.
In Vienna, we decided on El Tequila as the place to eat. It was a little off-trail, but there was a very wide new concrete path that made getting there easy. We arrived at noon, so I recorded that number before we went in: 34.6 miles.
I believe we were both full by the time we left, which was 1:00pm. We rode back to the trail on the concrete path, then stopped to say goodbye. I headed south for the 10 miles I had to do to complete my day. Jeff headed north for the 33 more miles he had to do before he was at his car.
Today was so much fun for me, Jeff is such a easily likable person and full of interesting stories. This meet-up is the highlight of my trip, at least so far.
Later I heard from Jeff. He'd made it back to his car at 4:11pm. I, on the other hand, hadn't arrived in Karnak until 3:22pm.
I checked out the campground's tent area first, then the RV area. I wasn't sure a tent was allowed to be set up in the RV area, and that's where I wanted to be since they have electricity. So I rode into town and asked at the city office. Yes, it was OK to set a tent up in the RV area, and I could pay right there at the office if I wanted, which I did.
I have to give credit to Jeff for keeping me at a "get-somewhere" pace this morning. If I'd arrived at this campground at my normal late time, I would have never had the tent up in time for the rain that arrived at 6:05pm. I did squeeze supper in between having the tent up and the rain.
The only disappointment I'm having today is, I thought this place had a shower house and it doesn't. But Karnak does have a Dollar General Store, so that'll be their redemption when I visit there in the morning.
Jeff
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Today's ride: 44 miles (71 km)
Total: 407 miles (655 km)
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