Day 40- Sterling, KS to Larned, KS

Thursday, June 28, 2012,  54 miles - Total so far: 487 miles*
    * Miles ridden on the TransAm route
    Odometer miles - Today - 54.4 Total to date - 524.8 miles
 
A "short" but tough day

We left Sterling College this morning at 6:00am to beat the worst of the heat again.  It worked to some extent, but it was still HOT.  The route today was 54 miles.  There were no services anywhere between Sterling and Larned - just a long flat route with almost no shade.  Nicole parked the van and trailer at the 25 mile mark which allowed us to get ice, Popsicles and water.

One bit of amusement in the early morning - yesterday at Sterling Simon put a plastic snake in Gina's computer which got a startled response from her when she opened it.  This morning Gina started her ride with the snake attached to her top tube.  As we rode she told me how it creeped her out because she hated snakes.

Gina's"pet" snake, courtesy of Simon

 At some point I stopped to take a photo of a sign along the road.  There on the ground was a small, dead snake.  After poking it with a stick to be sure it was dead, and seeing that it was quite stiff, so as to resemble Gina's plastic snake, I picked it up and put it on top of my rear bag.  Simon had ridden by just before that point, so I caught up to him and showed him.  We rode on down the road, caught up with Gina and I offered her a new souvenir to replace her other one.  She said it was gross and disgusting, but Simon got a pretty good chuckle from it.

Me with my new "passenger" on top of my bike bag

The snake rode with me all the way to Larned, though a portion of him broke off somewhere along the way in the heat.  At the church in Larned I dumped him outside.  I guess Gina didn't really want the real thing.

The first section of the ride today, to the rest stop, was pretty good.  It was 73F when we started and felt really comfortable.  As we neared the 25 mile mark the wind began to pick up.  It was mostly from the south so it was a cross wind, but a slight headwind at times.

Gina,Wendy and Judy approach one of the few bends in the road as the sun rises.

Interesting metal sculpture on the central plains of Kansas

Bare trees lining the road

Did they run out of room or not know how to spell?

Simon contemplates the necessity of a "Watch for Ice" sign as the temperature soars to ~107 today

This was the scenery most of the day

After the stop the wind increased a bit and it got continually hotter.  When we got to the 34 mile mark (the sign along the road said "Larned 20") it was quite breezy and hot.  The cross wind made it difficult to ride smoothly and at a decent pace.  Thankfully, the road surface went from relatively rough to pretty smooth right at this point.  That helped a little.

I found the last 20 miles to be very grueling.  It might have been better if I'd been riding for the past 4 weeks, but everyone agreed it was tough.  The good news was that our early start allowed us to arrive in Larned by about 11:30am.  The temperature was 93F as we rode into town.  Whew!  At least I made it.

The First Christian Church of Larned, KS - our overnight location - it's air conditioned!

The Masonic Lodge building on Broadway in Larned - built in 1887

Plaque commemorates the Santa Fe Trail - near the rail line and grain elevators on Broadway in Larned

We're staying at the First Christian Church on the main street (Broadway) in the center of town.  After everyone got settled and cooled off a bit we made a run to the local swimming pool at 12:30pm for showers.  Not surprisingly, no one wanted to stay long at the pool.  A few took a dip while waiting for the few available showers, but we all finished pretty quickly and headed back to the air conditioned church.

My private bedroom at First Christian Church in Larned - "The Gleaners" classroom

Tomorrow is 65 miles with the weather supposed to be about 1 degree cooler (a cooling trend!).  I'm not exactly looking forward to it, but at least there are services at two locations about 1/3 and 2/3 of the way along the route.

One personal note to all of my Purdue alumni friends - when I saw we were going through Larned, KS it sounded familiar to me.  I may have heard of it in association with the Santa Fe Trail, but I did a little research about Larned and found another connection which was probably buried in the back of my brain.  Larned is the hometown of former Purdue basketball coach Gene Keady.