Day 21- McPherson, KS > Emporia, KS (80 miles)

 May 27

The route:

A photo of Emporia (founded in 1857) back in it's heyday...I did not pack a suit, so I hope they have lightened up a bit on dress code.

Have I mentioned how awesome it is to ride bikes in Kansas? Today was another amazing day with beautiful views, great weather, and little traffic. I think we have met evil Kansas's twin brother, and we like this guy better. We started rolling through spectacular green pastures, lakes, and actual trees...I have missed trees. We kept a great pace today and called ourselves 'The Mellow Bus' to try to keep things chill on the ride and coast into our rest day. The ride was 80.8 miles in 4 hrs and 17 min, and we were all relaxed and glad to be heading into a day off. We have ridden 710 miles in the last 9 days without a rest day...thanks goodness it was flat terrain, but we need a day off the bike. The huge gravel race in Emporia is this coming weekend, so we'll mess around in downtown tomorrow, clean our bikes, and do laundry...the life of a bike monk.

Photos from the day:

Proper cows...and on full alert due to babies in the mix.

Finally seeing more colors in God's palette now...we were tired of tan and brown.

This is a river or a creek or a stream...definitely moving water.

I would put this in the Yeti/Bigfoot category...

I love this photo and lifted it from one of the guys in our group...not sure who the rider is but a great picture!

Griffin boys getting our pull from Fred yesterday.

A piece of metal art in one of the pastures we rode by today.

Trivia discussed at breakfast yesterday: Mark Twain is clearly one of the great authors from our country, and his given name was Samuel Clements - most of you knew that...where did he come up with the name Mark Twain? As boats are navigating rivers to determine depth that they can handle, when they got to 2 fathoms (12 ft), they would call out 'mark twain' to indicate safe water. Two quotes today from Mr Safe Water: "Learn to ride a bicycle. You will not regret it if you live." The second one spoke to me when I re-read Huckleberry Finn earlier this year (if you have not read this book as an adult, I recommend it); " The average man don't like trouble and danger." Well, we seem to be out of trouble and danger for now and are looking forward to very little eye contact with our bikes on Tuesday...

Final note and most important: Happy Memorial Day and thank you to everyone who has served our country. I wanted to put a comment in today's blog from Peggy Noonan's WSJ editorial from yesterday talking about the importance of loving our country, but it was too long. I can text it to you if you want it and do not subscribe to the WSJ - worth the read and text my cell if you want it. I do love this country and am blessed to get to see it from a bike... 

Thanks for keeping up with us. Talk again on Wednesday as we head to Topeka, KS!