Good reasons to avoid Interstate Highways

We left Chicago on Friday morning, aiming for somewhere near Indianapolis for our overnight stop.

Leaving a big city like Chicago is no fun on a motorcycle because of all the stop-start riding, so having the GPS take the fastest route seemed sensible, even if it meant taking an Interstate highway. This led us due east through the city for 10 miles, then onto I-94 south.

While we were barrelling down I-94 in reasonably heavy traffic at about 70 mph an old, dirty truck overtook us doing about 85 mph. Less than a minute later one of its tyres exploded in a cloud of dust, throwing large chunks of tread and other debris across three lanes. We were able to slow and manouevre safely around the obstacles, but it was quite scary for a moment.

Even scarier was the the thought of how we would have fared if the tyre had exploded as he passed us.

We continued south on I-68, but were pleased to turn off onto secondary roads as soon as we cleared the urban areas. After a stop for drinks and brunch we continued south and east on county roads and State highways. There was little traffic, even though this was the Friday heading into a long weekend. The pace was much less frenetic than on the Interstate highways and we enjoyed travelling through the fertile countryside covered with corn 2 metres high and dotted with farms.

Our route also took us through lots of smaller towns that the big fast food chains have not yet invaded and where one can always find a cafe or diner to stop and meet the locals and discover the real America

By mid-afternoon we found ourselves in Kokomo, Indiana - about 40 miles north of Indianapolis and decided to stay there for the night. We found a good motel at a very reasonable price, and used the rest of the day to catch up on our blogging and laundry. For the record, we only have room in our bags for 5 sets of smalls, so finding a laundromat every four days is a priority.