2017 Eclipse Day 2

Keokuk, Iowa to Norfolk, Nebraska:  434.6 Miles

I was awake way to early, but managed a little more sleep before getting up and having some hotel waffles.  The Keokuk motel waffle maker made four little ones which I had never seen before.  Most of the rest of the hotel was still sleeping, so I happily had the breakfast area to myself for 8 mini waffles saturated in syrup.

Once filled up, we hit the road again right at sunrise.  Early mornings on vacation are the best.  There is nothing like getting pushed down the road on a motorcycle by a sunrise.

The air was dense and cool in the mid-60's with roads that were all but empty.  It was wonderful.

There was one fairly unfriendly construction area, but thankfully there was no one else there except the flag dude.  That wet asphalt kicks up a lot of noise bits into the fenders.

Since I live in Southwest Ohio, I have known about a city called Cincinnati there.  There is one in Iowa too that is much more important.  Being so close, it only made sense to stop at the Iowa version.

After that diversion, the adventure continued north and west.  Traffic was extremely light for nearly the entire morning.  The area we were going through consists of the foothills of the Ozarks and the beginnings of the Loess Hills.  Anybody who thinks Iowa is boring has never taken the time to look.  It was absolutely stunning scenery to roll through.

I headed north on the interstate for a few miles going into Council Bluffs, Iowa.  In 2015, we went to the Rotary Jail in Crawfordsville, Indiana.  There is a similar jail in Council Bluffs that is a larger three-story unit.  However, it no longer rotates (the Crawfordsville jail still does rotate).
Council Bluffs is much larger than I anticipated, and it was a bit hairy to get around.  But the GPS did a good job of routing us to the historic jail.  Since it was Saturday, there was gobs of parking, but much of it was marked for official use only, even though nobody was working the weekend.  Eventually I just parked on a street and sent SO in for some change for the meter - who carries change anymore?  We were told that meters aren't enforced on Saturday so we could just park anywhere.  It would have been nice to know that earlier.  And to the guy in the Audi wagon - you are kind of an asshole.

The Council Bluffs Squirrel Cage Jail sits in a very neat historic Victorian building.

The staff at the jail was extremely friendly.  Entrance was a nominal $7 and well worth the cost.  The jail itself was neat to tour through.  Since the jail no longer rotates, the cells in the "outside" of the upper levels are no longer usable.  Seems some scaffolding would have been put up to make use of all the cells.

There are also many interesting exhibits in the jail.  Yes, that is an actual noose used in an execution, although it wasn't done at that jail.  Unlike the Rotary Jail in Crawfordsville, no one was ever executed in Council Bluffs.

The top floor holds the "apartment" for the jailer and his wife.  There is something about these old Victorian buildings, even if they aren't in the best of shape.

The top of the center of the actual jail can be seen.  Below these grates is where the, ahem, waste goes.  This is adjacent to the apartment, so it could be unpleasant for the occupants.  At some point the venting of this was changed to a cupola to alleviate some of the stank.

Happy that I've never been in jail outside of a tour, we walked a few blocks down to Ellie's Deli for sandwiches.  They were good, but it was also quite odd since there was a "Zombie Walk" at the same time.  This seems fine for kids or college students - I found the number of adults walking around painted like the undead a bit weird.  Maybe that is just me.

With the zombies out in force, it was time to head out again.  We worked our way north and west again.  Traffic definitely picked up in the afternoon and I couldn't help but wonder if any of it was due to the eclipse?
I had purchased a sun shade for my Garmin Zumo 660 from a German company.  In auto-translated English, the ad for it said it was impossible for it to come off.  But between the wind in Northern Nebraska and me lightly hitting it, the shade came off for the second time somewhere on US-275 (the first was in Council Bluffs).  Thankfully I turned around and was able to find it again.  At the next gas stop, a very nice cashier gave me a couple rubber bands which will make it flying away more difficult in the future ... hopefully.

Once into Norfolk, we found our hotel.  It is definitely an older place, and I would have much preferred to have been able to have an outside room, but such is life.

Dinner that night was a steak just down the road.  I really wanted the rib eye, but couldn't stomach the price.  The "branding iron steak" was pretty good though.
The evening finished off with a f'real shake - good, but it was no cookie dough ice cream.
Above all else, it was a fantastic day on the bike with some great sights to take in at the same time.

The eclipse is getting closer; weather forecasts are still all over the place.  I hope they converge in a good direction.

Incarceration Tour Day 4

Home!
Total mileage for the trip:  1068.7

On the previous two mornings of the trip, we had a lot of lollygagging around since the Rotary Prison didn't open until 10:00AM and our Prison Tour in Jefferson City didn't start until 9:00 AM CT.  This final day of the trip was more typical of a motorcycle vacation as we were on the road by sunrise.
Light rain had moved through the area very early in the morning, but mercifully, there was little rain as we packed up and the morning temperature was quite tolerable, if still a little humid.

Once on the road, I was really glad we stopped the previous night when we did.  Early morning is the best time to ride and this day was no exception.  Temperature was really quite nice and there were almost no other cars on the road.  I think it was nearly an hour before I even had to pass a slow moving Sunday driver.
The clouds in the area painted a subdued sunrise as we motored toward home.

The motorcycle ride through Southern Indiana hill country is very pleasant.  Lots of hills, beautiful green trees and enough straight stretches that we can still make good time.
In a predictable amount of time we were getting fuel at a gas station not too far from home.  Home by 10:00 AM, we had plenty of time to unpack and get settled before getting the dogs back from the kennel.

I prefer week(s)-long trips across country on the motorcycle, but these long weekends definitely do make a few days feel like a real adventure.
As far as trips go, this June quest on the Goldwing has to be one of the hottest and stickiest motorcycle tours ever, especially given the trip length.  June is usually cooler with a bit more rain expected, so I'll count myself as lucky that we only had at most 2 hours of rain.  Areas around us got deluged and much of Southern Illinois smelled like a marsh from all the rain.

As a bit of an aside, shortly before leaving on this trip, I replaced the windshield on my Goldwing with a Klockwerks Flare.  The stock windshield had cracked and I always hated how the top of the windshield could sometimes be right at the sight line.  The 14" Flare at the lowest setting is perfect.  There probably isn't quite as much wind protection when ambient wind was high, a little more during calm winds and it works quite well during heavy rain.  Baptism by storm.  Being firmly of the belief that looking through a motorcycle windshield is very, very wrong, I really like the Flare windshield.

Overall, what a great trip.  We rode through some really nice parts of the Midwest and saw some amazing, if somewhat tragic, historical aspects of the United States.  The tours were both interesting and the time away from the daily issues of life was a nice break.

Incarceration Tour Day 2

Total mileage for the trip 566.0 miles (I think)

The day started out normal enough for a vacation day with an early rise.  Since we left the previous night, we were less than an hour from our first stop of the day and they didn't open until 10:00AM.  So there was some putzing around the hotel room before leisurely leaving and taking the slow roads up to Crawfordsville, Indiana to see the Rotary Jail there.

The rotary jail in Crawfordsville, Indiana was the first of many rotary jails built.  It is estimated there were in the low double digits of them built in the US with several still standing.  The rotary jail being visited is reported to be the only one that still works (ie it still rotates).

The "innovative" design was patented by William H. Brown of Indianapolis.  The primary feature of the jail was that it increased safety and strict Victorian hierarchy by only allowing one inmate in or out at at time.

I really see two issues with the rotary jail.  First, if there is ever a fire or any other kind of structural or natural disaster, getting inmates out to safety will be slow at best.  Perhaps in the 1880's, when this first rotary jail was built, this was not seen as an important aspect; people in jail were a lesser version of human.  The other main issue was that inmates may get limbs, or other body parts stuck in the rotary aspect of the jail, causing mangling (or worse).  Similarly, I do wonder if an inmate bent on malfeasance could stop the jail from rotating by wedging something in place to prevent rotating.  Now throw in a drunk inmate and things can really get interesting.

Despite the innovative nature, the concept of the rotary jail did not last too long and by 1939, all rotary jails were either no longer in service or modified to no longer being rotary - making them just a pie shaped jail.  The Rotary Jail in Crawfordsville stayed in operation as a non-rotating jail until 1973 (seriously).  Apparently, it was in dire condition by then and required extensive restoration to turn into a museum.

The tour started with the Sheriff's house.  The Sheriff lived on site and his wife did most of the cooking for the inmates.  The house itself is pretty typical for Edwardian/Victorian architecture.  What was nice about this structure is that it was turned into a museum very shortly after it was closed as an active jail so it didn't fall into more disrepair or vandalism.

From there, we went into the jail.  As expected, the jail is a cylinder shape with two stories.  Each story has 8 wedges.  Each pie wedge could hold two inmates for a total of 32.  

In addition to the rotating part of the jail, there was also a woman's cell (could hold four), plus an infirmary which was also sometimes used for juveniles and/or a high security cell.

Throughout the tour, Dillon, our tour guide, gave lots of information and history of the rotary jail.  I will say that the $5.00 admission with personal tour was very well worth it.  Not only was the information great, but it also allowed the tour to move at a pace that was appropriate for us.

While the jail is restored, there is still evidence of its history.  In the picture below, the deteriorated floor can be seen below where the toilet used to be.  I guess inmates were not necessarily good at aiming?

There were 2 people executed by hanging at the Rotary Jail, but one required three tries.  If there was ever a case for cruel and unusual, that must be it.

As the only rotary jail that still rotates, I was glad they still do rotate it as part of the tour.  The effort it takes to spin the jail is considerable and didn't look like fun in the day's early heat and humidity.  I was surprised at the spinning rate of the jail as I had previously pictured something with much more gear reduction.

From there, we went down into the basement of the jail to see the actual workings of it.  The mechanism juts out of the wall.  The brick wall supports the bars of the jail.

The jail "pie" is actually supported entirely on this large metal post.  The post goes all the way up through the cylinder that is the rotary part of the jail.  Surprisingly, the support also holds the waste plumbing for the cells.  The incoming water for the jail was a cistern on the roof.  And this means that during a drought...

While we were down there, someone else started turning the jail as part of an inspection being done.  Seeing the actual mechanism working was very fascinating.

After looking around a few more minutes at the jail, we left to head to prison.  Normal course would be court first, but such is vacation.

We headed out through the flat land of Indiana and Illinois.  We stayed mostly to two lane roads through the day.  While we saw rain in the area several times, the only time we actually hit rain was around the Indiana/Illinois border for about 45 minutes.  It was moderately hard at times, but was almost refreshing in the days relenting humid heat.

We crossed the Illinois River near Hardin by a bridge, before heading south between the Illinois and Mississippi rivers to the Golden Eagle Ferry.  I've crossed rivers on the motorcycle before on Ferries, but never the Mississippi.  The water was up and moving so the ferry almost had to come in at a 45 degree angle.  Actual docking was very gentle though.

Once in Missouri, we headed west again towards Jefferson City.  There was significant traffic, but only for a short time as we got on the Interstate.  We skirted a very large thunderstorm that I was glad we didn't have to ride through on the motorcycle.  We did get to take advantage of the shade and cooling from the clouds.  After about a half an hour on I-70, we got off to take 2-lane roads the rest of the way.  I was really glad we did as the ride from that point was fantastic.  We headed down to near the Missouri River and followed it along all the way to Jefferson City.  The ride was hilly, curvy and with very little traffic was just plain fun.  I actually felt sorry for all those people on I-70 gritting their teeth with a death grip on the steering wheel.

As we approached Jefferson City, I was struck how close to the Capital of Missouri the rural landscape remained.  Jefferson City is a bit odd in that it is presumably close to the flood plain and there are no interstates running into it.

We got turned around a bit as we got into Jefferson City, but found our hotel soon enough.  Dinner that night was at Hoxton's Tarvern and Grill.  Other than one VERY loud patron it was nice and the food was pretty good.

Heavy rain was just moving in as we got back to the hotel to call it a night.