Joliet-Pontiac

Monday, Sept. 24, Joliet - Pontiac, 67 mi.

towns along the route: Elwood, Wilmington, Braidwood, Godley, Braceville, Gardner, Dwight, and Odell.

     Today I rode with my roommate Becky. It was extremely windy, making it a tough day. In Wilmington we saw stopped at the Launching Pad Drive-In, a roadside cafe operating since the 1960s. The attraction was the Gemini Giant, a 30-foot tall former “muffler man” later transformed into a space traveler.

We looked for the Polka Dot Drive-In in Braidwood, but couldn’t find it.

In Gardner we saw an old two-cell jail, and also a replica of  the Riviera Roadhouse, dating from the 1920s, which burned down several years ago

 

There wasn’t much going on in Dwight, it was very quiet as many things were closed.

     In Odell we saw a preserved Standard Station, built in the 1930s. We had a nice visit with the woman who was volunteering there.

The last ten miles into Pontiac went really slow. We were both tired of bucking that terrific headwind, only going 8 or 9 miles an hour.