“Weezy’s Route 66” Menu Cover Showing Hamel, IL, Mid-20th Century

Big bicycle day today, 50 miles and still feeling fine and hoping to do it again tomorrow. We rode the bicycle trails of Madison County today, which include many bike bridges, but also many bike tunnels too. We put-in at the Collinsville trailhead and then rode through Glen Carbon, Marine, Hamel and Edwardsville and then back again to the car. We had lunch at Weezy’s Route 66, which is a bar in Hamel. I took a photo of their menu, for the picture with this post. The building on the right is where Weezy’s is now. It shows an electric trolley passing through town. This trolley must have hauled tourist from Saint Louis out into the country, for a little fresh air. There are the remains of this elevated trolley line that started in the near north side of downtown Saint Louis and crossed the Mississippi on the McKinley Bridge. Part of it has already been converted to an elevated bike trail and there are plans to do the rest of the line and make it into something like NYC’s High Line someday. We also saw Kaldi’s team members Bob and Evelyn, who were also out on their bikes in Madison County. The weather was so beautifully cool today and dry too for a change. Anne called it cabin weather.