Awesome.

The Arkansas

Deer

The past two days have been gorgeous, though we've just been in the foothills. Yesterday, we took a 57ish mile ride into Pueblo, which is a pretty awesome city. As a city, it has its slums as well as its fancy neighborhoods, but for a town with a population smaller than Huntsville, there were a ton of bike shops, good places to eat, huge city park/zoo, etc. We stopped by the bike shop to get my handlebars re-taped (and man are they comfy now), brakes checked out (they're good for now), and derailleurs readjusted (apparently my shifter is screwed up). The guys there (intersection of Santa Fe and 4th for anybody interested) were super nice and super awesome. They they suggested another super place for lunch right down the street - Taqueria Delicious or something like that. This place had ginormous burritos (and other stuff) for under $4, and for those of you looking for a refreshing beverage, they had this mango water stuff that was wonderful. The ingredients are (easily enough) mango and water. I'm not sure how they make it, but there were tiny bits of mango left in the stuff, and it was really sweet. They had to have some great mangos. The people were really friendly too, which is always a nice thing. After leaving Ordway (which has a cool fountain/sprinkler thing in its city park), we headed into some pre-foothill hills. And though I don't think I've seen a sand dune before, I'm pretty sure we went through an area with a bunch of scrub-covered dunes. The area was gorgeous semi-dessert, with an installed lake here and there for fishin'. We saw prairie dogs (cool) and a deer or two. Halfway through, we stopped to get a package and something to drink, and I ran straight into my dad's fender stay (think sharp metal rod). Totally impaled my leg (the thing probably went in .5-1cm deep), and my leg swelled up like mad, making the last half kinda painful to pedal. So I just stopped pedalling with my left leg and did the last 20 miles using my clipped-in right leg. Toward the end of the run, we joined US 50 and saw our first running trains since Missouri. It's kinda refreshing to be around mountains and trains again; I really can't explain how much better I feel surrounded by mountains, and these are some kick-ass mountains. Also coming into Pueblo, we passed an exit to Pueblo's Chemical Plant thing (Huntsville people: think Anniston except they have to ship their stuff to Anniston for decomissioning; non-Huntsville people: think chemical weapons). A little disconcerting, but there were still mountains and trains, so I was happy. Temperatures were a lot more comfy, too.
Today, we got up and took 62 miles (50 + riding around town) to get to Canon City (pronounced Canyon), which is right beside the Royal Gorge. The town is pretty touristy (gateway to mountains and a good place for rafting), but nice nonetheless. Today, we hit some larger hills and, at one point, had made 6000+ feet (that climb was a tough one, though the grade still didn't get me in lowest of my gears). We left Pueblo, went through their rather large city park and zoo, and hit our first blip on the altitude map pretty quickly. It was a long hill, but the grade wasn't anything to kick me out of second gear. We continued slowly climbing toward the mountains, with Pike's Peak off to our right and some beautiful country in front of us. It stayed pretty desolate for the first half of the day, and we got to see quite a few more deer. They don't really look like the ones back east, either. Eventually, we started hitting town after town, including one that has a ton of prisons. Colorado has a ton of inmates, and with warnings that if you take a newspaper, you can get a year in prison, I think I may see why. Word has it that they also doubled penalties for felonies sometime. Not the best way to decrease the number of people in penitenteries. The one that we passed outside of Florence, CO is a federal supermax prison that has the who's who of bad guys (shoe bomber, unibomber, oklahoma city bomber, etc) - tis one scary place. It looked like some resort or something aside from the double layer of razor wire and scary signs. When we got to Canon City, we rode around town for a few hours checking out the train that goes through the Royal Gorge and the section of the Arkansas by the train depot (it's the takeout for one of the more intense sections nearby). Tomorrow, we're taking a zero and having an awesome time being tourists. We get to do the dual train/raft thing, and it looks like it will be outstanding. The river is III-IV (V- if you believe the companies), and it's above the recommended flow right now. Sounds intense and exciting to me. After our zero, we have one hell of a climb up to just below the top of Hoosier Pass. We go up a long, steep thing to our first pass at 9000+ and then keep climbing (eventually over Hoosier and down into Breckinridge/Silverthorne). I figure if I can make it through some class V stuff (and I'm claiming that even if AmericanWhitewater says I'm wrong), I'll be ok with the altitude (cause we'll be camping around 10,000 feet and that makes me nervous). Anyhoo. After biking over 2000 miles, I'm not gonna let a little inability to breath stop me :^D

I can see the Rockies!!!!!!

Wahoo!!! Though today was still flatish and tomorrow will be too, we can see the rockies on the horizon. We're in Ordway tonight (in an awesome, cheap, being-restored hotel that's pretty darn luxurious - complete with luxurious towels), and we arrived with pretty good timing. We got up at 4:30 again this morning (yay) and completed the 63 miles just as it was getting hot. The road still wasn't all that great, but around the halfway point it did turn green. Different colored pavement always amuses me (we had pink back in Kentucky). Near the end, we ran into 12 miles worth of Union Pacific cattle cars just being stored on the track. The terrain hasn't changed that much (still scrubby and rolling plains), so the graffitti entertained me most of the ride. We've run into a ton of cyclists within the past few days, many of whom are doing the Western Express to Transam (San Fran to Yorktown). Shortly after I got settled, it started thundering and pouring rain. Though that's cleared, I'm still quite pleased we weren't on the road for that. Tomorrow, we go to Pueblo - the launching point into the Rockies. I'm pumped about the mountains. Some New Zealanders warned us that there can be long stretches with little food/drink, but that'll be more toward Wyoming (which starts in the next map set).

Channeling Dorothy

We're not in Kansas anymore, but I could be convinced otherwise. We got up super early this morning (thank goodness). Stars were still out and everything. The sun broke the horizon just as we rolled out of the gas station (refilling water bottles), and we thouroughly enjoyed a cool, not-horribly-windy ride in to Eads, Colorado (about 45 miles in from the state line so 60 miles total for the day). There's a lovely library that we're hiding out in right now (yay airconditioning) right next to the town park we'll be camping in tonight. Pool and showers are two blocks away and food is within easy walking distance. We ran into another cyclist last night who's headed from Brooklyn to San Francisco (through a bunch of large cities) and who's making a documentary as he goes, and he'll be camping with us tonight. It wasn't 60 miles unsupported (as the map says). We were quite pleased to find a well-stocked gas station 30 miles in. We've passed a bunch of completely dry "lakes" and "creeks," and it almost seems like the crops stop at the state line. There are a few smaller wheat fields over here, but the majority of the land we've seen thus far is just scrubby fields where they're pasturing cattle (and empty fields of sandy dirt). We now have rolling plains as opposed to dead flat stuff, and there are also clouds (which were rare in Kansas). Road surface sucked today. Bumps started 20 miles in, and they kept coming until around mile 54, when we merged with a US highway. Butt isn't happy, but we're talking about a zero day sometime soon (hopefully in the mountains).
Dad has control of the computer, so I'll update with pictures later.

Wheat. Lots and lots and lots of wheat.

This is the one we checked out

Yay Windmills!!!

So called sky scraper of the plains (at some point was the tallest building between Denver and Kansas City)

Note the giant piece of farm equipment that had just passed us (took up the entire road)

"Pole posts" - limestone since the plains folk couldn't find trees

Most towns look something like this

This is what a midwest town looks like when you're coming into it on a bike

Scary, huh? Rubbing in sunscreen is not one of my dad's strong points

We've made it to the high plains of Kansas. (Tonight, I think we're at 3500 feet - ridiculous for a place as flat as this.) It's still in the 90s and 100s, and it's still windy, but things are ok. Thankfully, there have been several places to get snow cone-type things and slushees (which are my new almost-favorite thing). Cookies have taken the favorite thing place. So a couple days ago we went from Larned to Bazine, about a 54 mile ride through more flat, boring country. We had a brief but wonderful tailwind and got a mid-morning snack at a really cool place where you could get lots of cookies and coffee for a quarter. The people were nice, but we wanted to get to this bicycle B&B as early as possible. We got in around 1:00, and the lady who ran the B&B (aka an extra room in her house) was pretty crazy. Definitely a hypochondriac. She was sweet enough, though, and we had a giant dinner and breakfast with her. One major problem though - the air conditioning wasn't all that great, and I was sleeping in the far corner of the house. I don't sleep well when it's in the upper 90s, and I ended up getting approximately five minutes of sleep before launching into a 68 mile ride. Needless to say, the next day was problematic.
So, we got out of Bazine the next morning and headed to Scott City. I was dragging like mad, and while my legs felt ok, the rest of me was dead. So, I put my head down and charged ahead, looking up occasionally. My brain wasn't processing at all, and I didn't notice that my dad had stopped ahead to take a picture. I ended up slamming into the back of him, of course. I hit the pavement, but no harm to the bikes or us. The rest of the day was hot and tiring. We finished up with a slushee and then went over to the Athleticlub in town that had a hostel and pool. I hopped in and got a swim in for the first time since May. (It's about darn time.) Unfortunately, my judgment was still screwed up from the lack of sleep, so I went for a competition-worthy turn without goggles and slammed my heel into the side of the pool. There was blood, so I had to get out :( We got really good food at a mexican place named La Fiesta in Scott City after that and groceries for the next few days. It was hot again, and there were some super-creepy sounds in the middle of the night (footsteps upstairs in a locked building and rattling doors). Got more sleep than the night before but not enough.
This morning, we got an awesome breakfast (giant pancakes) and went about 48 miles in to Tribune, KS. There was more flat, boring stuff in the high prairies, with more feedlots than in the past. It's been hot and dry enough that the harvest is starting though. We stopped by a grain elevator to learn how it works (awesome) and were right across from a field being harvested. The combines go through the fields, shoot the grain into another thing that takes the grain from the combine to the 18-wheeler grain trucks. When those are full (about 60000 pounds fit), they go over to the elevator's office, where the truck is weighed, and the grain is sampled by this robotic arm. The arm vacuums two samples from different parts of the truck, and the office person tests the quality (moisture level, how much is cracked/chaff, etc). The truck then dumps its load through a small funnel at the bottom of the truck, and these small boxes carry the grain up to the top of the elevator. If it's good and dry (like the stuff dropped off today), the grain goes down a conveyor into a warehouse-looking "flat storage" (which can hold 500,000 bushels or 15mil pounds) next to the tall towers. The taller towers hold less and seem to be more for drying grain/keeping poorer-quality stuff away from the rest. All in all, it was pretty cool. Tonight, we had some adjusted hippie pasta (spiral, multi-color pasta) with rotelle, green peppers, cheese, and chicken. Nom. Add some sides of grapefruit and spinach, and we were two happy campers. Tomorrow we ride 60 miles with no services (though there may be a chance for water). We're within 15 miles of the Colorado state line right now.

Suck it up!!!

Grain elevator = you're in the midwest; Water tower = town

The Arkansas (hopefully we can raft it later)

Excitement for the day - 60 miles of nothing makes everything special

Ok, so after I was all whiny on the last post, we launched into two 70+ mile days (76 and 71). The first was from El Dorado through northern Witchita to Hutchinson (most of that in the rain), and the second was from Hutchinson to Larned (with full heat/humidity and 60 miles without any place to get water/food). Yesterday, the rain was a godsend; the winds stayed down around 5mph (and were mostly at our backs), and our average speed stayed up around 15. It was cool with very little traffic and enough places to refuel. When we came in sopping wet for second breakfast, the waitress found us towels, and all the folks were friendly at the gas station we had lunch at. We made Hutchinson both feeling good, and holed up in a church basement "hostel." Dad got his bike looked at by a costly bike shop, but they did help him out a bit. There were tornados all over the area, but we didn't notice a thing. The ride was around more corn/wheat/cow fields, and I kept my head down most of the ride to avoid catching the rain/salt mixture running all over me.
This morning we got up pretty early and headed the 10 miles to Nickerson, KS. We stocked up with food and drink and headed into the 60 mile section with no services. We might have seen 20 houses along that stretch. Maybe. Lots of fields (corn/wheat) and a few feed lots toward the end (horrible smelling, and kinda sad with all that lovely pasture surrounding the lots). We've run into an increasing number of Eastbounders, and they sound pretty at peace with the Rockies. Hopefully we'll have a good time of it. I started off with low energy this morning and couldn't convince myself to ride faster than 11 or 12 mph. As the day wore on, I continued at my comfortable, slow pace, but the heat started getting to my dad. We were both quite happy to see Larned and its airconditioning. Went through a marshland somewhere in the middle of nowhere, and there were a ton of birds (many of which neither of us could really ID). Bugs were annoying around that area, needless to say. Looks like we're about 3-4 days away from Colorado now. The next 60 mile unsupported area is coming up, so we get 3 easier days before picking it back up to 60-70mile days. I also get my next book and good shades soon. Wahoo.