Kansas 2019 Flint Hills & Prairie Spirit Trails

One of the cairns along the trail. (WE waved back.)  We had a relatively leisurely morning.  In no hurry to be riding in 40° weather, we lingered over breakfast at Prairie Belles Kitchen.  It was warming and satisfying.  Before walking back to the Kirk House, Diane made a quick stop at a thrift store where she bought a stocking hat to wear under her helmet.  Rob was content to wear his standard under-helmet thin cotton handkerchief.  Brr!  As we were about to mount our bikes, Diane got out a pair of Smartwool socks to pull over her fingerless gloves, and off we went at 11:40 AM.  By this time, it had warmed to about 44° and the sun was shining, but the wind was, again, cold and adverse. Nonetheless, we did enjoy the ride!   The thing about “out and back” rides – it’s not like you are seeing the same thing twice.   The views and vistas are remarkably different because of perspective.   Even the trail seems different – we of...

New day and a new trail - but uphill against the wind. Something was apparently off with the Applebee’s chicken.   Rob became nauseated during the night, threw up, and slept poorly.   But by morning the nausea had dissipated and he felt well enough to eat. The hotel breakfast was meager and disappointing, but enough to power us up for the short ride to Garnett. Walmart was nearby, so we stopped in for a can of WD40 and Snickers for the day’s ride.   Back at the hotel, Rob inspected the bikes and gave the chains a WD40 treatment, and soon enough we were off and headed to the Prairie Spirit Trail for a 23-mile gravel ride south to Garnett.    Diane, anticipating a cold ride and not wanting to cowboy up, had donned leggings and her raincoat.   But she quickly became uncomfortably warm and removed her leggings and raincoat, and we were off again. The trail was in good condition, but the surface had been softened by the rain.   That, plus...

Osage City to Ottawa Let it rain. We're ready. (Fingers crossed.) As we drifted off to sleep at the Koch Guesthouse, the rain and wind were at it.   When we awoke, Rob checked Weather Underground, to date the most accurate weather forecasting in near-time.   He announced that if we waited out the two major morning storms and left at noon, we could possibly avoid rain most of the day.   We confirmed with our gracious hosts that it would be okay to make a late departure, and enjoyed our leisurely breakfast, and used the to time to take extra precaution in “dry-packing” our panniers.   In addition, Rob wrapped our panniers in large plastic garbage bags.   Our panniers (purchased new in 1982 for our first long distance tour, an 1800-mile ride from Moses Lake, WA to Redding, IA) have seen thousands of miles, through all kinds of weather, and they are in remarkably good condition, but it never hurts to take precaution against driving rain. As planned, we s...

Flint Hills Trail from Admire to Osage City We have had a very special week at the beautiful Frank & Angela Carter farm in Lecompton, Kansas.   Frank (Diane’s brother) and Angela hosted a reunion for the Carter siblings and their spouses and offspring, where we were wined and dined in a most spectacular fashion, with lots of time for family fun.    Today Frank drove us down to Admire where we launched our first day’s ride on the Flint Hills Nature Trail.   The ride was intentionally short—a shake-down day for our reassembled bikes (after their flight from Seatac to Kansas City) and for our bodies (which for the last week have been overfed and under-exercised). We did fine on the ride.   Plus, the trail was in fairly good condition.   There were a few scattered areas of ballast, sand, mud, and water, but all easily traversable with no need to dismount.   Most of this section of the trail was canopied by large shady trees, and the...