100 miles from Alexander KS to Leoti KS. (Pronounced like ray liotta)

If there was such a day, this is the day we would run into the Wicked Witch of the West.
8 miles to a soda machine for a much needed coke for Jacob, 35 miles to a shady spot for a rest. 50 miles to a Kwik Stop convenience store break.
On day 23 Jacob was bitten by a horse fly. As he swatted it away, he lost his right ear piece for his headphones. Gone. Needle in a haystack to look for it. Today Jacob swatted at another bug and lost his left one. Gone. Bye bye music. Hello instead to (as Jacob describes them) “the voices” inside his head.
Now to quiet the voices, Jacob talks to me about the Homestead Act. We debate about whether or not either of us would have made the journey out west back in the day. Then he speaks to me as if he was writing from the west to a friend back east… “To my dearest friend Robin…life here is splendid” etc. Now I kinda wanted to silence the Jacob voice at this point.
SW Kansas… desolate, hot and windy. The winds mainly blew in a north-easterly direction. Well, isn’t that just perfect since we are going to the south west?!? It was tough to even maintain 10mph.
When big mack trucks passed us going 70mph in the opposite direction it felt like running into a hot brick wall. We literally would stop pedaling for a few seconds in order to bring all attention to controlling our steering… gotta keep going straight and not veer off the road. The truck wind could move our biking line six inches to a foot or more.
The other thing about Kansas is that the terrain generally goes uphill from east to west. It looks totally flat, and sometimes it is, but we’re “going up” most of the time. Sometimes it feels like we’re on an incline even when it’s not…or it’s just a really gradual one. We can see miles to the horizon. Sometimes we look at the horizon and think “oh, if we just make it there to the to of this crest we will get some relief and go downhill for a bit”. Nope. That “crest” is just the curvature of the earth. We just get to keep pedaling against the wind and maybe slightly up until the end of the map.
The terrain actually reminds me of the ocean. A green prairie ocean on either side (no trees) with the road a straight as an arrow endless boardwalk out to sea. Sometimes I half expect to see the tip of Christopher Columbus’s sail boat cresting the horizon.
We did find shade in Scott County (hi to my little bro Scott!) about 24 miles from our destination. We walked the bikes thorough some grass to the shade of a cute little tree.
After our rest, Jacob’s rear tire goes flat. As he’s fixing it I notice my rear tire going flat. It seems we had walked our bikes through a thorn patch! Jacob’s front tire also went flat. Yikes, that was no good. We picked about 60 thorns out of the tires.
This means we ride into the night. 7p and 24 miles still left to go. “Ain’t no thing but a chicken wing” is our saying. We flew though the last miles, used lights, watched the gorgeous sunset with windmills in the background, and made it to camp around 9:15p. This sunset ride was one of my favorite parts about the whole trip so far.
Wicked Witch, where you at?  Missed ya…or was that you with the thorns?

We were tucked in our sleeping bags next to the splash park (Jacob in his hammock.and me in the tent) by 8:30p on day 22. However, the park officially closes at 10p. So, of course, from 9-10p, local hooligans (preteen kids) attacked the park and made enough noise to keep up awake for another hour or so. I hear Jacob mumbling curse words under his breath and then I hear a kid yell “We can be more quiet!” Followed by Jacob “We appreciate it!”. They eventually left, told us “Good luck sleeping!” and Jacob says goodbye by hollering “Good luck choosing a girlfriend!” (he could hear the dramatic conversations of the preteens…)
At 10:15p, we hear a train roll close by. After the no-sleep-train-fiasco of the previous night, both Jacob and I moan and scream in unison “Noooooooo!”. Luckily that was the only train that night and there were no whistles.
We woke up relatively refreshed and had breakfast at the Kwik Shop convenience store. Met a man who’s sister lives in Alexandria VA and he proclaimed “DC is filled with crazy people”
That morning we knew we would ride over 100 miles, including a tough first stretch of 60 miles without any services. We stocked up on water, gatorade and snacks and hit the road.
We took two breaks during the 60 mile trek. It was tough to find shade and once the sun came out out took about 20 min for the water in or water bottles to warm to the temperature of hot tea.
At about mile 45, we were crop dusted. Well, really the field right next to the road was crop dusted. I don’t think we actually got hit. It was so cool to see the extremely low flying plane cross back and forth over or heads. It looked and felt close enough to touch.

We did manage to make it the 60 miles and took a long lunch break in an air conditioned Subway restaurant.
We continued on and made it to Rush Center (13 miles from our destination) where we hoped to pick up food to cook for dinner. Nope. The stocked liquor store was open, but that’s about it. Jacob asked the liquor store owner if we could camp inside the store. It was nice and cool in there! Even though Jacob was serious with his question, the owner laughed it off.
Jacob downed a green “buzz ball” (strong tequila drink), we both had sodas (excuse me, “pop”), and left Rush.
Our camp for the evening was a rest stop in Alexander, KS. Pop 65. It was beautiful (gorgeous sunset) and the bathrooms were clean. I ate tuna on a tortilla from our food bag for dinner.
We fought a lot of wind and heat today. Another “century day” in the books.

Sleeping in the gazebo at Cassoday city park seemed just fine. Sure, the mosquitoes and flies were out, and yes, there were countless gigantic spiders in the outhouse (my “outhouse” in the middle of the night was a tree instead), but the temperature was lovely and the stars were gorgeous. Then came the trains. Oh, the trains. We were 100ft from the tracks. Trains came every 15 minutes throughout the night. I am not exaggerating. I lived next to train tracks in college and have dealt with the rumbling noise overnight. But I swear these effing Cassody trains had the world’s loudest and longest whistles. There are 128 residents of Cassoday, yet the conductors seem to expect all of them to be milling around the tracks at all hours waiting to get hit. Jeez. So, we got zero sleep. Literally.
At breakfast we spoke to a man who’s mother owns a house by the tracks and he says the loudness of the whistles has forever been a problem for his family. Poor guy!
We saw some cool things today. Rode by an airfield and saw 4 tiny planes doing loop-de-loops, rolls and flying in formation.
We saw a calf being born.
We also made it to 1650 miles, the point Jacob had designated as “halfway”. We are passed the point of no return (cue phantom of the opera). Although Melinda told me “you know, when you get to Missouri, you should probably just keep going. Not worth turning back after that”.
A local cyclist on a spiffy neon yellow Bianchi road bike talked with us for about a mile as we rode. His bike looked so speedy and light. Jealous! He told us he always thought about doing a cross country trip but never has made the time. Jacob and I are so lucky.
We made it to Nickerson around 5:30p. The main street is bricks (bumpy) and the side streets are dirt/gravel/sand (my enemy). We walked our bikes on a side street about a quarter mile to our city park camp site. The city park had bathrooms but no showers. Then what did we discover? A SPLASH PARK. OMG what a fun shower!!! We put on swim suits, lathered up, bathed, and “did laundry” like hobos. So much fun!

After showering we hit up the Pizza Connection that had a Jesus fish doormat and a “wrong” anti-Obama sticker on the window. We did not talk religion or politics to the proprietor. Before our food arrived Jacob serenaded me in a Kermit voice “why are there so many…songs about pizza?”. I looked at him like he was nuts, didn’t get it until he got to the “rainbow connection” lyric and instead sang “pizza connection”. Ok, ok, got it.
As we walked back on the dirt road, Jacob said “Nickerson county…we can either pave streets our build a ridiculous water park…whaaaat?”
Back at camp we met a toad. Jacob told me to kiss it so I could finally meet my prince. I told him “that would be too easy…and I’m not done with my adventure yet anyway!”.

We thought we might be able to say goodbye to Marco and Ronny in the morning but the kids slept in. Apparently they have done some illegal camping in other cities. They try to wake up super early and get out of there, but they have actually gotten ticketed a few times. This was a legal free site, so they took advantage of the extra shut eye. Marco actually goes running up to eight miles per day in addition to his daily bike miles. Hard core. This is a navy seal in the making.
Jacob and I ate oatmeal at camp and got going early.
There were not too many rest stops on our route but about 40 miles in we hit a nice restaurant. When we asked to use the rest rooms the lady said “follow the yellow bricks” (on the floor)…I skipped to the ladies room humming “follow the yellow brick road”. She said “good girl!”
I went outside to make a peanut butter and honey tortilla (yum) and happened to meet Adam, an attractive solo west bound cyclist from Toronto, Canada. Which is funny because we just went through Toronto KS about 5 miles ago. We chatted for a while and he asked if Jacob and I were married or a couple (that means he likes me, right? haha). We might see him again since he’s headed for San Diego and plans to arrive there around the same time Jacob and I plan to get to Morro Bay.
After Adam and I said goodbye (sniff sniff), a gentleman in the restaurant warned us “you got a few hills between here and Cassoday!”. I looked at him and said “No we don’t! I don’t believe you!”.
“Hill” is a relative term. There were some baby inclines, maybe “Kansas hills”, burt nothing scary. At all.
We stopped at another restaurant close to Eureka. The sign on the door said “closing at 6:15tonight for the middle school football game”. The nice owner of the store told us her grandson is the starting QB and this is his first game. She couldn’t miss it. When Jacob asked if she had any other grandkids, I heard her say “oh yeah! You know those 20 goats you passed on the corner? Those are my grandsons”… I looked at Jacob nervously for a second…this crazy lady thinks goats are her grandsons and she is probably sitting here watching us fatten up on candy like Hansel and Gretel before she will cook us and feed us to them! Now, what she really meant was “those goats are my grandson’s”. Possessive. He raises and shows them. She’s just a proud grandma.

After our rest we passed Homer Creek, DOH!
The road in the afternoon was beautiful and deserted. We didn’t see a car for 20 miles. On this road we passed a wild horse sanctuary. The sun was just beginning to go down and there were about 50 horses together at the fence closest to the road. When they saw us coming, they took off galloping about a quarter mile in formation. It was gorgeous!

We made it to Cassoday and set up camp at the gazebo of the city park. There were spiders in the out houses. Tons of them.
We got some grub at the country store and heard about a few recent break ins. The manager told us “yeah he took tobacco, jerky and all the candy except for the twix”. Huh.
There was a box of free home grown tomatoes at the store. I ate 4.
As I was getting ready for bed I was secretly wishing that I was watching the first NFL game of the season. But I’m still having fun here!

Jacob and I snacked at the hotel instead of really eating dinner on day 19. All evening and through the night, Jacob looked forward to the continental breakfast waffles at the super 8.
Breakfast opened at 6 and Jacob got to it. I slept in since I knew we still had to wait for the UPS shipment with Jacob’s wheel to arrive at the bike shop. Estimated time noon-1. 
I hit breakfast around 8 and met a few sets of retirees who, at the breakfast table, mind you, had GPS devices loudly telling them “drive to the road and turn left”…and “recalculating”. They also had giant road atlases. They told me about a Vietnam memorial at the PSU (Pittsburg State University) campus that is similar to the one in DC. Didn’t make it there.
Leisurely morning of stretching and relaxing in a Mexican restaurant parking lot followed by a Starbucks hang out session for me while Jacob made his way to the shop. 
Although I didn’t see it, I hear Jacob did a happy dance in the store and might have even kissed the new wheel when he saw it. He threw it on the bike, trashed the old one and we got going around 1p. Jacob says “rumble strips, you don’t scare me no more! See my shiny new wheel? Ha!”
A little while down the road we see a sand-colored coyote watching us from a soy bean field. Jacob loves coyotes and this was a highlight of the trip for him.
Chanute, KS was our destination for the evening. About 20 miles out, we run in to a “road closed ahead” sign and decide to take the detour. Then the detour has a road closed. No open roads to Chanute? I’m muttering “no gravel no gravel no gravel” like “no whammy” under my breath and when we hit the bridge that is closed we ask the workers nicely if we can sneak across. “If it was this morning, no way, but these guys worked hard today so I think it’s safe”. Oh gooooood. We make it safely across.
A half mile outside of Chanute we run in to Marco and Ronny, teenage west bound cyclists (going our way) from PG county, walking their bikes. Uh oh. Ronny’s rear wheel is messed up even worse than Jacob’s was. We told them we’d meet them at the park and Jacob would help. It turns into a fiasco but Jacob managed to jimmie the wheel (after a second trip to Walmart to get a tool) so he could make it hopefully to the next bike shop 20 miles away. 
We had zataran’s rice and pork meatballs for dinner. It was delicious. 
Marco and I chatted for a bit. He and Ronny are enlisting in the navy after this trip. He worked at papa johns and a construction job to save up money for his journey. We also told each other our “falling” stories. The day before we met he was climbing up a hill and noticed a grasshopper on his pannier along for the ride. He decided to use one hand to swat it away, and then, when that didn’t work, he tried the other hand. Then he realized that he was climbing up the hill with “no hands”. It was at this point and in conjunction with this realization that he bit it. Ouch.
We slept in the tent by a baseball field in the city park.

This morning’s goal was to make it to Pittsburg. Pittsburg, KS. Jacob had a new velocity 40 spoke wheel built and shipped to the Tailwind bike shop. He was soooo excited. It could mean the end of the spoke problems.
About 35 miles in (not as easy as yesterday’s 35!) Jacob calls velocity and gets a tracking number for the wheel. It will NOT arrive today. Scheduled for delivery tomorrow. Looks like we get to sleep in Pittsburg and wait. Uggh.
At this point I was upset. Why not pay for second day shipping since now we have to pay for a hotel anyway? And it will cost us a day of riding. I tried not to blow up and show how upset I was, but I know Jacob could tell. I ate about a million banana chips at the rest stop and felt awful.
We put on happy faces and rolled on…only 30 more miles left today.
Missouri’s streets are letters instead of numbers. Jacob’s favorite was DD. I like MM (mmmgood). We also saw a sign for Miller, MO 8 miles in the wrong direction (sorry Jacob, no can do).
Jacob was hit in the helmet by a giant Men In Black type bug. It was the size of a golf ball. I saw the whole thing happen and he turned and said “what the eff WAS that?” His helmet passed the first test of the ride.
We also crossed a highway in front of a school bus that was going way faster than we thought. “FASTER, Robin!!!” I hear in the “bad Coyo voice” Jacob reserves for special emergency circumstances only. Like yelling at dogs to stay out of the road. I think that bus was doing 75 easy.
We left Missouri (misery) in the dust and arrived in Kansas. Seeya, wouldn’t wanna be ya, MO! I was feeling a bit light headed so we took a nap under a tree and ate some hard boiled eggs.
My belly started hurting after the nap and I barely made it to the super 8. I showered quickly and crashed in bed for 3 hours. Maybe this unexpected “rest day” is actually a blessing.

The humidity dropped overnight. Hallelujah! We woke up early to get on the road at 6:30a. We rolled west from Houston MO, mostly downhill, and had a lovely morning. We didn’t stop for rest, bathroom or anything until 35 miles in. That’s a record! What an easy 35 miles. We stopped when Jacob saw a sign that said “PIE”. 9a Jacob had a piece of peanut butter pie, I had some eggs and a clif bar. The food was great, but the smoky breakfast room was not. Cough cough…”Let’s get outa here, Jacob! We got 76 miles left today.”
As we rode down the lovely deserted road (no motorists for miles and miles), a white pickup truck blows by too close and the passenger flips us off out the window. Seriously, MO?!? I said “they must hate their lives or something”…Jacob said “their parents must have been run over by bicyclists”.
The miles after that ticked by quickly and easily.

At another rest stop I couldn’t find Jacob for a while. I assumed he was taking a nap somewhere around the gas station. Turns out he met Ken, an east bound solo cyclist going from Idaho to key west fl. Cooool. He has also biked from Alaska to Idaho. Super cooool.
Later on down the road, around mile 80, Jacob thought “man I could use a cold drink”. Then we see an SUV pull over ahead of us, take two ice cold bottles of water out his back seat cooler and flag us down. Gary lives in Kansas City and was helping his brother install a new roof on his home in Fair Grove MO over the weekend. He told us about a competitive cyclist who also grew up in Fair Grove and competed with the old Jelly Belly team. Nice, generous guy.
101 miles were very smooth, but I’ve found that no matter how far we go in a day, the last 10 miles are always hard.
We made it to Ash Grove and found the city park where cyclists are allowed to camp. We took elephant showers …really good water pressure…and started to cook dinner at the pavilion. Matt sent me a screen shot of Ash Grove MO pin pointed on a map of the whole US. We are almost halfway across!
Then a cop came by and gave us the key to the house next door. Seriously. We finished cooking inside and slept on cots in A/C. Yay Ash Grove! Goodnight!

When we checked in to the classy southern inn motel where we will spend two nights, the check in guy gave us one key. “Only one key?”, I asked. His response (Indian dude with a british accent): “Yes, you’re in Houston, MO, there’s no where to go anyway”
Jacob and I were both awake by 6a…for no good reason. Our bodies did not get the memo…it’s our rest day!
I ate breakfast outside at a picnic table and did some reading.
Then I loaded up our smelly laundry and headed for the laundromat down the street behind Walmart.
After laundry I camped out at McDonalds, had a second breakfast, talked to mom on the phone, read, wrote and relaxed. An older gentleman asked if he could have 1) the spare chair from my table and 2) my egg McMuffin. I said yes and NO way!
Meanwhile Jacob was back at the room doing bike stuff. I came back to a bike shop-smelling room at naptime…doh. We aired out the room and both took glorious naps.

Went to pizza hut for dinner. The teenage kid waiter told Jacob he wasn’t welcome in his “John Deere” shirt. We did not get the joke. He said “my father’s a logger” and what I should have said is “my father’s a pilsner!” (HA, joke YOU won’t get that’s just not funny either! “Jerk store, I’m going with jerk store!”…Seinfeld, anyone?)
I chowed down on salad and pizza. We calculated that I eat more calories than Jacob does per day. A ton more if you don’t count the soda he consumes.
Jacob went to Walmart for one last supply trip and I rushed back to the room to catch the start of the Nats game since it was on espn.  The TV had the weirdest channels we’ve ever seen. Espn was 106-1. NASCAR was on. “Nooooooo! I hate Missouri!” I composed myself and turned the channel to 94-1 (espn2). Phhhhew, there were my boys!

After a while Jacob returned and joined me in baseball watching. In the 5th inning or so the score was Mets 5, Nats 2. “Well, it doesn’t look like the nats are gonna do it tonight”. I looked at him with steely eyes and said aggressively “WHAT is YOUR problem?”
Of course he ate his words, Nats came back for a “third out shirt out” save by Soriano. Ha! I fell asleep happy.

Some tidbits from our first 1000 miles:

Jacob had: 1 tick, 2 “bee in the jersey” scares resulting in one sting, 1 huge moth in jersey, one million nats attacking his face.

Touring bike milestones:
The first day I could barely manage to get on and off the beast due to weight and balance issues.
First two days I had to tap the brakes going downhill beginning around 25mph because it started feeling “squirrelly”.
It was day 3 before I felt comfortable reaching down for and drinking from water bottles while actually riding. (took me 3 whole days whaaaat?)
Day 4 I had our top speed clocked at 40.5mph (don’t tell mom!)
Day 5 I noticed every time I cough or clear my throat my quads would “shiver” and talk to me.
Day 7 my bike fell on my leg and cut me up a bit. Grrrr I’ll show you who’s boss, bike!
Day 10 Jacob said “I love how you are manhandling that bike now!”
Day 13 I finally felt comfortable to listen to music (low volume) while riding.

When people ask where we stayed last night (any “last night”), we look at each other with blank stares for a few seconds, hmmmm think about it, and generally come up with different answers… days blend together into one big biking soup. Was last night the church or the campsite? Doesn’t matter…

Dogs are passionate about bike tires. They hate and/or love them… Lots of barking and chasing.

We went slowly up the VA and eastern KY mountains. Sometimes so slowly that I would see a fuzzy caterpillar crawling across the road in front of me and not be entirely sure which way to go around it…sometimes the caterpillar was faster than me. And sometimes, I swear, that caterpillar turned into the stoner caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland and began taunting me. “You are not Absolem. I am Absolem. Whoooo are yooou?”

Lacrosse ball rolling is magic for my upper back and traps. I tense up going down mountains and need to brake a lot which causes  rock hard knots. Thank you Dr. Kempe for teaching me the healing powers of the lax ball!

We took route 11 a long way in VA. Days and days. Route 11 is also Lee hwy. I could have biked from my parents’ house, took one right turn on Lee Hwy and gone all the way to KY!

In KY there’s no way around being covered in a layer of coal dust from morning to night.

Jacob doesn’t know how strong he is. His body will do more than his mind thinks it can. I, on the other hand, think I’m stronger than I am (I’m superwoman, right? Riiiiight, egomaniac!). We make a good team and keep each other in check.

1000 down, just a few more to go!
Xoxo Robin.

We had a pleasant night sleeping in the city park. Jacob made friends with two little gray kitties… then chased them away from our campsite since I’m allergic to cats.

In the morning we hit the rest rooms at the 21 diner and had breakfast there. They had a curse word jar (each word was $1), so we kept our conversation clean this morning.
Rolled out around 7a.
Instead of the usual VA/KY roadkill (skunk, raccoon, deer), we now began to run into dead armadillos. “Close your nose!”, Jacob screams. Much worse than skunk smell.
We made it 12 miles at a great pace when Jacob spied a place to rest. “Really? I don’t need a rest yet!” Good thing we stopped because he needed to change a spoke. He hadn’t noticed it since we are now riding with headphones. Will have to pay attention to that!
A lady at the grocery store told us her in-laws host cyclists and to be careful on these roads because “people in MO don’t understand cycling”. Duh, we found that out yesterday in labor day weekend traffic!
The rest of the day was spent climbing the Ozark Mountains.  They are not nearly as steep or long as the VA monsters, but it was one million degrees outside. We both thank our lucky stars we went though VA in a relatively chilly, overcast spell. Not sure I would have made it in the heat and humidity.

At the peak heat hour, 2p, we stopped at a rafting and convenience store in Alley Spring for A/C and cold beverages. We met Eric and his family (owners of the store) and chatted for a while. He is a super cute 27yo who is training for his first full marathon and a triathlon. Jacob suggested I take him with us…move him back to Arlington!
Eric told us we had one more tough hill to Somerville before the terrain leveled out. He was right. The last 37 miles was steady rolling, but mostly climbing. I took it really slow and tried to be as efficient as possible. I told Jacob that I wanted to spend the least amount of energy necessary to make it to our hotel. I have the computer on my bike so I know exactly how many miles we have left. Jacob does not. When he saw the “Houston 10 mile” sign I hear “What?!? Aaarrrgghhh I thought we were so much closer! Gaaah!”
We survived and rolled in to Houston MO at dusk.

We showered (best shower yet!) and went to the Cozumel Restaurant across the street. They serve real margaritas and beer! Score one for MO!
Jacob was intoxicated after 2 margaritas and a muscle relaxer. We stopped at Walmart on the way back to restock our food bag, he sang in the aisles and told the check out lady “Rachel, that’s a lovely name, my mom always told me to find a nice girl named Rachel”. At the hotel we both crashed immediately. Rest day tomorrow!
Church sign today: “Choosy moms choose Jesus”.