Day 13 - Minor Diversion!

What should have been a simple run back up the i65 from Branson onto old route 66 which straddles the four lane interstate east west highway turned out to be a day full of adventure.

The i65 wasn't an issue and we joined America's Main Street at Springfield and on to visit the hometown of Mr Hubble who invented the telescope by the same name.

By chance Ramona from the Munger Moss Motel was at the Route 66 Museum in Lebanon and she warned us of what was in store.

Back at her motel nearby, after showing us around some of her period rooms, we mapped out a plan to try and get around the damage done by rain and flooding over the last couple of days. The i44 was severed in three places for a total of 57 miles.

We headed north on Hwy 5, to the Ozark Lakes, cut east across a couple of other minor roads to find a way around... stopping periodically to get updates on what was open and what was closed.

Called the Missouri Dept of Transport and they worked through all the possibilities but every road over the Glasconade river was cut for 100 miles either side of the i44.

Eventually we found a path back around the flooded roads and by the time we reached the interstate they were letting local traffic through the middle section we'd reached.

The waters had receded back from the low lying areas around the interstate bridges at Devil's Elbow and we slipped back onto the old road at Rolla by 3.30pm.

Things were really rocking by the time we got to Fanning... actually Dean commented that it was a fake because the world's biggest rocking chair couldn't rock, but it still caught his imagination!

The Wagon Wheel in Cuba was a welcome sight - the local pessimists (none of us!) reckoned we wouldn't make it but we did and that called for celebrations out the back of the motel.