Day 20 – Last Day of the Week and Looking Forward to a Rest!!

The sun greeted us brightly but thankfully the humidity had slept in for at least for the morning hours! We began our day on another dangerous busy road. US 50 coming out of Emporia, KS was terrible. With as nice as the people are in this state the drivers this morning are rude and in a hurry. Trucks buzzed us like Tom Cruise did in Top Gun to the flight tower, birds flew out of cars like pigeons out of a barn, and cars made no effort at all to get around us. It was not a hard decision to get off this road and onto a less traveled road. We turned on the road of choice and were immediately happy with our decision. I say immediately because the pavement on which we rode was the same color as the gravel that was about to make drumming sounds on our frames.

The gravel seemed to go on and on till finally we got to Strong City, KS. We had no sooner gotten off our bikes but a nice older lady approached us with two school desks. She sat us down in them and gave us a quick history of every shop in sight. She was born and raised there so I trusted her implicitly. The one bit of information that interested us was the oldest functional courthouse in the US. We got out of our desks and got on the bikes and rode to the next city where sure enough we found this fabulous stone courthouse nestled in the center of town with cobblestone streets leading to it in a all directions.

It was another moment that made us feel like we were somewhere back in history (except for the digital camera in one pocket and cell phone in another).
Shortly outside of Cottonwood Falls, KS we climbed hills to this beautiful scenic overlook! Trust me, a little picture cannot do justice to the amazing view that we enjoyed for a few moments.

We battled a headwind for about 1.5 hours since we were going south, so at least there was a light at the end of the tunnel when we would go west and enjoy it partially to our backs. We came around this field that was completely lined with this stone fence then around the next curve was this awesome house with another fence. The time it took to build this fence must be immense!


Because of the nagging headwind, I was not enjoying the ride as much as I could have but about every 30 minutes we encountered a string of about 5-10 old cars that would sound their horns and bring a smile to my face and put me in a slightly better mood for a while! It was neat.

They all waved to us as if we were a long lost cousin! Great country we are in!

We pulled into Cassoday, KS (the Prairie Chicken Capital of the World) for lunch and enjoyed a lunch buffet of chicken tenders, beef and noodles, salad, and strawberry shortcake for dessert! It was awesome and just the fuel to get us to the next city, which was 39 miles away, and nothing in between!!

We settled in for the long ride, passing field of cows after field of cows. I think in the entire 39 mile stretch we were passed by about 10 cars only had to stop 1 time for a stop sign. This is pretty desolate country. We had just passed the halfway point when a van passed us. This was not highly unusual except that they stopped on the side of the road and motioned for us to stop. The man, who was driving, poked his head out the window and told us that his house was 5 miles up the road and if we wanted to stop he would give us more water and a nice place to stop. Only in Kansas! We stopped!!!

Dave and Karen were two of the nicest people you will ever meet and they generously gave us each an ice cold Gatorade, filled our CamelPaks with water and sent us on our way with wishes for a great rest of the trip to Seattle, WA! Awesome people!! Again a reminder to take every opportunity to be kind to people! We can be angels for other people along the way.
The rest of the trip went well. We entered Newton, KS and visited where else, Dairy Queen, and got back on the road. Abby had called and told us of another route that would cut a few miles off our remaining 11 so we jumped at the opportunity. The final 8 miles seemed to take us about 15 minutes since the wind was in the same direction as the road. We averaged about 22-24 mph!!! This is nice to fly like this at the end of the day! We entered the campground at 4:15! This was a great day in more than just a quick biking sense!
The day was topped off with a fantastic supper engagement. About 20 miles from our campground lives a friend that used to be the administrator at the small Christian school in Cadillac, MI. It was nice to see Rick and Susan Roberts again and renew a friendship with them. We had a great supper and time of fellowship! He is a wonderful godly man and there is no wonder that the LORD has used him for so long! LORD, help me to be this kind of man of God!