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.