The requisite state entrance sign:
Crops next to one of the straight Kansas roads:
Moooo! Wow, look at that big sky!
Today the gang is in Wichita, KS for the evening. Tonight they are staying at a home found via couchsurfing. Michael reports that the residents are classical musicians and had a record collection of classical music that he really envied. He wished he could listen to it all, but that alone would take several days.
Today was another day of mostly long, straight roads. Michael said that the days of riding here go something like this: ride 30 miles west, turn right and ride 10 miles north, turn left and ride 15 miles west, turn north and ride 3 miles north, turn left, etc etc etc. The constant tempo without much gear changing has made them pretty tired because going at the same pace and in the same position all day leads to cramps and aches.
Michael had a dinner of falafel and cheese after which he took a walk and could see storms in the distance. Below is the radar for tonight in Wichita thanks to NCAR weather. Wichita is the point in the center of the light blue. The red, yellow, and green all around is a squall line of thunderstorms. Fortunately Michael and company are not in the serious rainfall areas, so Michael was just enjoying watching the clouds and lightning on his evening walk, but this storm is no joke. Much of Kansas is currently under flash flood warnings and these storms can produce the tornadoes that Kansas and the rest of "tornado alley" are famous for.
Fortunately tomorrow will be a half rest day, so hopefully they'll get to stretch some too! Michael hopes to visit an aviation museum tomorrow in the town they're riding to. But it seems that the planes are very present in Kansas; he told me "I was definitely on the sky all today." There were lots of general aviation planes and biplanes up and about as they rode into town, so he enjoyed that. I read online that Wichita is home to Boeing, Cessna, Learjet and Ratheon, so it is no surprise that the city has also been nicknamed the "Air Capital of the World." He also got really (and yes, I mean so excited it hurt my ear to listen on the phone) excited about a twin-rotor helicopter flew overhead at a really low altitude (thanks to Dr. Howard here!).
But there aren't just airplanes around Wichita. Michael and crew rode through El Dorado, KS, home to the state maximum security prison. At a gas station in town they ran into a guard who, along with many people, found it amazing and unbelievable that these kids are riding all the way across the country on bicycles. I find it pretty unbelievable that she can work with the serial killers in prison. To each their own, I suppose. I think I'll stick to the climate modeling though.
Random notes: Michael has apparently acquired a new riding nickname: M-bot (or variations of that ilk). The group has decided that he is THE authority for knowing how to fix bicycles, knowing about planes, knowing about the clouds and storms they always see, and also predicting the weather. So he'll go for a walk or to the grocery store and come back and be bombarded with requests to fix the chain on this bike, or maybe adjust the derailleur on another bike, etc etc. I think he likes being the group mechanic/bike authority and I certainly look forward to his help on tuning up my bicycles!
Michael is thinking about possibly taking the Western Express route from Colorado to San Francisco instead of riding north through Wyoming to Oregon. I think he's going to bring it up with some of the kids sometime soonish. Maybe they'll wait till they get to Colorado and take a bit of a longer break. They're hoping to get to CO by the 4 July so they can see fireworks and celebrate because there aren't many sizable towns between where they are and Denver. If they miss the 4th they can always make Bastille day though! ;)
That's all for tonight, but I'm wishing them good weather, good winds, and speedy travels.
No comments:
Post a Comment