Day One – Home to Des Moines - Miles: 647
Since we were staying under 700 miles we didn't feel the need to leave before the break of dawn. We headed out at daybreak and rode the interstate to the other side of Indianapolis before exiting. We didn't get very far before we encountered our first detour. It wasn't terribly far out of the way, but it was not well marked and we had to do a little back tracking. Just south of Danville we jumped back on I-74 for a couple of exits and headed north on IL49. Our first planned stop was in Rantoul IL where there is an old decommissioned Air Force base. Chanute AFB dates to 1917 when Congress decided it needed more investment in the air service. As late as 1939 the AFB did not have any concrete runways, but during WWII the investment ramped up quickly and it became a state of the art base. It continued training airman through the Korean and Vietnam wars. It also provided training for Air-Launched cruise missiles as well as Ground-Launched and MX missiles. In 1988 the military decided the base was no longer needed and was decommissioned and finally turned back to the city of Rantoul in October of 2023. After 30 miles on US136 we were back on I-74 until we got on the other side of Bloomington. We stopped in Pekin IL which sits on the Illinois River at the downtown park named Mineral Springs. It was a nice park and we stopped in a shaded area, and had a few snacks as it was 11:30. While we were there I looked at my phone to check out the route which I knew had us going through Fort Madison. Fortunately I noticed that the bridge going into Fort Madison was closed and the detour would have taken us well out of our way. We did some re-routing on the fly and wound up going through Burlington and staying on US34 into Fairfield IA. Once there we wanted to get back on the route and go past the American Gothic landmark. We thought it might be fun to get that picture but as we tried to go the back way we hit a gravel road and decided it was not worth the effort. We got back on US34 and rode it until we were nearly due South of Des Moines. Before we headed north we stopped at the Welcome Home Soldier Monument on the outskirts of Albia IA honoring veterans of all wars. We were staying at the Hampton on the west side so we stopped at Barn Yard Brewing for a cold one and some grub. We headed to the lobby and spent the evening enjoying some wine and preparing for the next day's ride.
