Day 3: 5/28/2022: Land Between the Lakes to Cave-in-Rock State Park

 It was a quiet, dark campsite last night.  I slept well, but was awakened in the middle of the night by a large tree limb breaking off and falling to the ground.  Thank goodness it was in the distance.  I quickly went back to sleep.

Due to most towns having little to no services, most of my meals today had peanut butter as the main ingredient.  I'm hoping I can eat a good breakfast tomorrow at the state park restaurant.

By the pic below, one might think I've already made it to Kansas, but it is actually at the Land Between the Lakes.

BISON!!!

Woohoo, another State....

Pic below of the marina at Grand Rivers, KY.  I didn't ride through the town's business district because I had done that before.  It is a touristy little town just north of Land Between the Lakes.

Then came Smithland, KY. It's a small community on the Ohio River.  A few pics below around the town.

The bridge pictured below crosses the Cumberland River just outside of Smithland.  They are in the process of building a new bridge to replace the current one.  Fortunately, the traffic was not bad when I went across the bridge.

A few pics of my scenery this afternoon.  The terrain went from flat to hilly (some very steep) several times today 

I went through a little...

...in Kentucky.  (Literally)

A few pics below of another little community located on the Ohio River I went through.

Most, if not all, of my route today was on a portion of Adventure Cycling Association's (ACA) Underground Railroad bicycle route. For about the last mile today, the Underground Railroad route overlapped ACA's U.S. Bicycle Route 76 which runs from Yorktown, VA, to Astoria, OR.

Below are pics of the ferry that transported me and several autos across the Ohio River to Cave-In-Rock, IL.

My 3rd state to ride in today (Tennessee, Kentucky, and Illinois).

Opry house in Cave-In-Rock.

I'm camping at the Cave-In-Rock State Park tonight.  Steve, the campground host, let me pitch my tent under a pavilion for free.  Tonight was the first shower I have had since this trip began and it sure was nice.

I had a lengthy conversation with a couple of young campers, Miles and Katrina, about my bicycle travels and life in general.  It's always good running across perfect strangers and getting to know a little about them.  Miles offered to share some "real food" with me when I told him a peanut butter sandwich was what I had for supper.  I thanked him, but declined his offer because I was actually full.

I do have a bit of a crisis.  I have somehow let myself run out of bananas.  Those of you that know me know that I'm a big, and I mean BIG, banana eater :) This whole banana predicament started last night.  I knew I was getting low on bananas (I always try to keep 4-6 bananas in my bags on a trip at all times).  I went into a Dollar General just south of Land Between the Lakes.  It happened to be the only store I went in that day that sold bananas.  They were 35 cents each.  I knew that was high, but in my situation, I was going to pay it.  On a bicycle trip, I usually buy the smallest bananas when I pay by the pound because they fit better in my bags.  However, this pay by the banana concept changed my plan and I picked out the largest bananas; best bang for the buck.  There was a line at the register to check out, so I decided to use the self checkout.  Things went fine scanning everything I had and then I got to my bananas.  There was no "Look Up Item" like the self checkouts at other stores have.  Not knowing what to do, I panicked and set my bananas aside and didn't buy them.  Okay... I know... the male pride thing about asking for help or directions got in my way :)

I ate my last banana this morning thinking I would restock in Smithland as I had already looked on line and saw Smithland Grocery there. I passed by a Dollar General about a half mile up a hill from Smithland Grocery, but didn't stop there for bananas because I wanted to give the local store my business.  When I got to Smithland Grocery, I discovered it was nothing but a convenience store.  They had bananas.  When I asked the price, I was told 69 cents per banana.  Nope, just couldn't pull the trigger at that price.  I decided not to backtrack up the hill to the Dollar General, hoping that one of the other towns along the route would have a grocery store with bananas.  Nope - so here I am banana-less getting seriously anxious about when I will be able to get another banana.  You got to understand the importance of bananas to me.  The list is like God, my wife, my kids, my grandkid, my granddog, my bananas...:)   If this drags on too long, I may be willing to pay $3/banana:). Y'all, this is serious.

Total miles today: 93.6