Changing Gears: Rey's Ride Across America

July 7th — Scott City, KS to Larned, KS — 118 miles This morning we got underway at 6:30 a.m. Rest days are great, but it makes it tougher to get going again mentally. When I woke up, I noticed the wind was whipping up pretty good. It came out of the southwest to the northeast at about 15 to 20 mph. When we started out I had a cross wind slightly at my back: Since I was headed east it was in my favor, at least for a while. I was able to push out 20 to 22 mph for the entire morning. In Kansas the scenery is full of gold wheat fields already harvested for the year and green corn fields about knee high. Also, cattle grazing and feeding are huge here, and you can pass thousands of them in a day. I can see 2o miles ahead of me. The plains are amazing with beautiful gold and green fields as far as the eye can see. It is actually very calming to look at since you can see for miles and miles at a time.

After lunch we had to turn south for about 20 miles. Ouch! The wind was in my face and reduced my speed to about 10 mph. We arrived in Larned at 3:30 p.m. and passed by Ft. Larned, another military outpost to guard the Santa Fe Trail in the mid to late 1800's. We toured the fort and then headed to the RV park for some rest. The temperature today was 106 degrees with the heat index, but it's still a dry air so I didn't feel too bad all day. 6.5 hours on the bike today.