Day 15- Tucumcari, NM > Dalhart, TX (94 miles)

 May 21-

The route for today:

I needed to give myself some perspective on our journey, so I placed a dot on Dalhart to see how it looked...see below:

Some progress made but more to do!

Today was going to be another long mileage day, so the main variable would be the wind. The wind helped us for the first 60 miles and then became a cross wind. We still finished the ride in less than 5 hours, which is a good way to retire 94 miles without much scenery (sorry Ron - maybe it will get better on the way to Guymon; I'm sure it was prettier when you were here). The wind was blowing 20 mph when we walked out of the hotel to get started, and you just have to get ready for it because it works on you as the day goes on even if it is helping or across you. We were heading northeast today, and the prevailing wind was out of the west which means it blows across you from the left on the bike. This means you lean left in a tough crosswind, which gets old after a while, but we paid to get tortured like this, so we gotta pedal. The day was a good one overall as we rolled into Texas and Central Standard Time. We did see a big pronghorn between us and the fence along the highway, and he was running towards us and trying to figure out where to go...it was bizarre and very close to us - we took this as a sign that we should keep riding our bikes to the next food truck. One of the guys actually saw a female bear yesterday with a cub...never would have suspected that on the terrain that we saw yesterday but pretty cool.

A few photos below from the ride:

As we rolled across the line...note the bullet holes in the sign - love me some TX!

While this looks dramatic, there is no cause for alarm.

If you decide to become a cow, I recommend doing so in a place other than Dalhart, TX. If you zoom in, you might become a vegan (Rusty's bad joke).

If you lived out here, you'd need one of these and a kite and a gun or two.

A couple of quotes for today since I took yesterday off on the quote machine. The first one is slightly inappropriate given the context of when/why he said it versus why it came to my little mind on this bike trip - Gandhi said "There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of food." I read that in The Covenant of Water (previously mentioned chick book that is amazing). The bonus quote is one that I take comfort in: "A religion that is small enough for our understanding would not be big enough for our needs." Correi ten Boom...if you do not know much about this lady, go read a little about her; she reminds me of Big Ammachi in The Covenant of Water.

Tomorrow, we will leave the great state of Texas and head into Oklahoma. Kansas awaits, and we might see some folks we know there...(Josh/Jim???). Talk to you from the land of the okies tomorrow!