"Plowing" Across Kansas... And a PSA

Bales of wheat straw

We are making great strides in getting across Kansas as quickly as possible.  We have put in several long days of riding.  In the last 4 days we have gone 94, 104, 119 and 118 miles.  I have never done 3 centuries (100+ miles rides) in a row before.  I have done 4 in the last 6 days, so we are really rolling up the miles.  We are currently in Herington, KS which is straight north of Wichita.

But now for the Public Service Announcement.

Jim and Heidi, our son and daughter-in-law who live in Seattle, have had a great opportunity come their way.  Last week they found out that they are going to be a part of a Pro-Am racing team which will travel to France for a 4 day charity racing event in late July called Trois Etapes (read more at the link).  This will be a fully supported race just like the pro's with a support car, race radios, the whole nine yards and they will be racing in the mountains of southern France.  Now for the hard part.... As part of the team they have to raise a substantial amount of money for their team charity, World Bicycle Relief.

World Bicycle Relief is a non-profit organization focused on addressing transportation hurdles in rural Africa. They have local assembly facilities and offices in Africa where specially designed bicycles to help kids get to school, allow healthcare workers to visit more rural patients, and to assist farmers getting their products to market are assembled. World Bicycle Relief has distributed more than 135,000 bicycles and trained more than 850 field mechanics over the past seven years. 

Jim and Heidi have teamed up with two other local Seattle cyclists who are also on the team and they are calling their effort Racing 4 Buffaloes. Buffalo is the name of the bike that World Bicycle Relief designed specifically for the rugged African environment.  As a team of 4 they have a goal to raise $60,000 for World Bicycle Relief.  Clark and Randy, the two other riders from Seattle, have been fundraising all year.  They have given the team a great start toward the goal but they need your help!  Jim and Heidi are getting a really late start since they have jumped in to replace two riders who have dropped out and left a big fund raising shortfall.  

Jim and Heidi would greatly appreciate you donating to World Bicycle Relief to support their team on such short notice and most importantly the worthwhile objectives of World Bicycle Relief.  100% of your donation goes directly to World Bicycle relief and is tax deductible; Jim and Heidi will be paying all of their own travel costs for this race.  If you feel it is a worthwhile effort please make a donation of any amount you see fit.  You can contribute directly by following the link below and it will be credited to their team's fund raising goal.

Click Here to Donate

And now back to our regularly scheduled blog.... 

As I mentioned before, it is wheat harvesting season.  A lot of the wheat harvesting is done by contractors from around the country going from farm-to-farm.  Yesterday (Saturday) must have been the day to rotate fields.  We saw 10 or 15 of these semi's hauling wheat harvesters flying down the road.  We were riding in pretty good cross winds most of the day and when one of these monsters comes flying by at 65mph, you need to get your head down and wait for the air blast and road debris to clear.  They clearly aren't very aerodynamic.  Nicholas and I met two these semi's side-by-side, one passing the other, on this same road. We were both looking for a place to hide and the wind blast from two of them was pretty impressive.

We have been pretty lucky the last couple of days with the weather.  It was 106 F when we rolled into Eads, CO a few days ago, but the temperatures have been dropping everyday since then.  It was about 95 when we arrived Scott City, KS and in the mid-80's yesterday when arrived in Great Bend and the low-80's today when we hit Herington, KS.  However the wind was a bigger factor today, blowing very steadily at 10-15 mph out of the north-northeast.  Except for some very short sections where we headed south, it has mostly been a cross wind all the way across Kansas.  So much for getting any good tail-wind rides across the plains.

We are now into the eastern section of Kansas with rolling hills, more like northern Missouri.  Today, coming into Herington, I had a little section where the road turned to gravel for about 3 miles, but at least I got to cross one more famous trail along the way, the Santa Fe Trail.  That should pretty much cover the famous western trails.  We spent plenty of time on both the Oregon and Lewis and Clark trails in Oregon, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.

Tomorrow is scheduled as a "short" day at 70 miles to Osage City, KS.  We'll stop there and drive about 25 miles to Topeka, KS to visit the state capital building.  Then Tuesday, we'll be leaving Kansas and heading for our old stomping grounds in Missouri.

Again, if you can help Jim and Heidi with their fundraising for World Bicycle Relief, we would all greatly appreciate it.