Missouri="Huh?" say cross-country bicyclists

Sometimes they got more than a roof over their heads. For instance, Shawneetown, Ill., was the first place they were asked to convert, to Baptists, and later in the trip they were offered Mormonism, and in a poor Missouri town, money.

“A 19-year-old stranger came up to us and said, 'God told me to give you guys $40,' just like that,” Nelson said. “So we were psyched and went to the pizza buffet. That same day, same town, a woman walked up to us and said, 'My kids don't want you to sleep outside,' and bought us a $100 hotel room for the night.

“Usually after a few days of cycling in a state we'd get an overall sense of the place,” she continued. “But in Missouri we said, 'Huh?' right up to the border.”