I Can See For Miles

By -


The Boot Hill museum was OK. The entry fee was modest and there was a replica of the old main street with functiong stores and saloon and some information about how the town became so notorious in the late 1800's.  We had a beer in the saloon and mooched around the exhibits for an hour and can now tick that one off the list.

The next morning I assembled everyone in the car park to deliver the line I have been practicing for weeks......."Right, let's get the hell out of Dodge!". 

Outside of the city centre it seems that Dodge is still heavily involved in the business of receiving young cows from the surrounding ranches and intensively feeding them ready for market.  These feed stations are huge and ugly, with several thousand cows being fed in muddy pens.  The similarities to our Chinese Buffet last night did not escape me!


Kanasas is flat.  To illustrate just how flat it is:  on a typical day we climb 2000-3000 feet over about 70 miles.  Today, over 85 miles, we 'climbed' fewer than 300 feet.  As I said....flat.


We have a new game to while away the miles: as a grain silo hoves into view we have to guess how many miles will pass before we get to it.  This provides endless hours of hilarious fun.....on a long day there might be 3 or 4.  The big news of the day is that we picked up a proper 'push in the back' tailwind.  What should have been a testing 85 miler turned into a 4 hour blast at warp factor 10.

We are now in Great Bend, named after a bend in the Arkansas River.  Tomorrow we have 104 miles to do and it looks like the wind might have decided to crap on us from a great height.  Bugger.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll/Mr Tamborine Man/I Write The Songs

By -
Image
  After an 18 month separation Plum and I are reforming the band for another tour.  The two of us, plus 6 others, are heading up to Scotlandshire for another crack at the North Cost 500.  I should probably introduce the full line-up:   Lead Singer - David.  David is the young(er) pretty one.....brother of John.  David also happens to be my Financial Adviser and is funding this trip (plus a yacht and a cocaine habit) out of what he makes from my account.   Lead Guitar - Nick.  Friend for 50 years.  At school Nick was a keen cyclist and consequently, quite rightly, bullied.  Nick has forgotten more about cycling than I will ever know.   Bass Guitar - Stuart.  Stuart and I worked together for many years; he has powerful legs and can push out big watts while looking like he is coasting.  I hate Stuart.   Keyboards - Michael.  Michael is a...
Read more

If I Could Turn Back Time

By -
Image
If ever you are in the Inverness area on a Friday and looking for a lively night you could do a lot worse than avoid Muir of Ord.  Our hotel, the only pub, wasn't serving food so we walked into town where it appeared that Steven Spielberg had just finished filming some sort of post-apocalypse movie: nothing open, nobody on the streets and the odd bit of tumbleweed blowing along the pavement.  Even the fish and chip shop couldn't be arsed to open...on a FRIDAY NIGHT!  We managed to find a take-away offering a rather odd choice of kebabs and curries (served in pizza boxes for added novelty) and purchased some food which made up for in calories what it lacked in food-hygiene standards.   I recall a meeting where a few of my co-riders and I met to kick around ideas for a group ride.  We considered all sort of destinations....mostly in those parts of Europe where the weather isn't consistently shite.  I'm ashamed to say that I thin...
Read more

Julia's Song

By -
Image
As some readers will know, Plum is no longer Chard's most eligible bachelor.  The lovely Julia has taken on the job that Social Services would otherwise have to do....making sure he changes his pants once a week whether they need it or not and loading routes onto his Garmin.  We are all very grateful to Julia, especially Chards most eligible bachelorettes who can get back on the dating scene now Plum is safely off the market. As we were starting our trip Julia fell, dislocated her foot and broke her Tibia so she is probably missing Plum more than usual. She has insisted that the show should go on so thanks for being such a trooper. Today was another with a shortcut that promised to turn a very hard day into something more manageable.  Some of our group took the high road and others took the low but I had a more cunning idea.....get in the van.  Whatever is ailing me, long covid or acute spinelessness, reached the point where pushing th...
Read more