The weather turned very warm as I entered the plains. For the first few days, I had a bit of a tailwind for some of the time, and was making pretty good progress. But the past few days have been mostly cross or headwinds, and combined with the heat have really felt like a slog. I think it was 4 days in row with the high above 100. Each day I’ve gotten up early, trying to be on the road before 8 am, and get in 40-50 miles in the cool weather as quickly as I can. Then I’ve been finding a restaurant, bar, or park to hang out in until late afternoon before continuing to ride. I’ve gotten a few cheap hotels, because the forecast said it would still be 80 degrees at midnight, which makes it pretty tough to sleep in a tent.
Each day I head East, it has gotten slightly more humid, slightly greener, and starting yesterday, I started seeing trees again. Eastern Colorado and Western Kansas is mostly dry rangeland, but that soon gave way to wheat and corn fields. Today I even stopped at a farm stand at an orchard. The towns are slowly getting bigger as well. Tonight I’m sleeping in a town park in a town just northwest of Wichita.
I’ll soon be veering off the Transamerica trail to head north to pick up the Katy trail in Missouri, where I’ll be meeting up with Zach on Monday. I’ve heard nothing but good things about the Katy trail, and am looking forward to hundreds of miles of traffic-free riding – as well as being close to a river!
