After a wonderful experience in Newton, I headed out and when I first turned on the road that would take me east, all the way to Cassody, I found a most glorious discovery: overnight, the wind had shifted and was coming out of the west and blowing hard east! I was fired up in all regards and decided that I would make the most of this day and go as far as my will would take me; and in this wind, my will was just as happy and strong as my legs. I started to go and the more I rode, the better I felt. I had my music playing and I was dancing in the saddle. Kansas may have been kicking me in the face throughout the past five days, but it was my turn and I was kicking it in its paved butt, tearing apart the tar with rapid gusts of pedal strokes. I was smiling the whole way and just taking in all the beauty. Kansas, in being barren, can get pretty tiring if one is having to go against the wind and struggle to make it across the state; however, when the wind is at your back and it's nothing but a breeze to get where you're going, the scenery turns beautiful with the white-as-angel clouds strutting across the blue-as-ocean sky like thousands of heavenly spaceships slowly drifting through. And I couldn't have picked a better day to find the rolling hills of eastern Kansas than a day where the wind had a hand on my back to aid in my ascents. The grass was kind of green that whoever invented the word green must have looked upon to come up with the word 'green'; and that green rolled this way and that forever and ever and the whole of the countryside looked as though it had just jumped right out of a photograph and into the world.
I made it to Cassody in no time at all and blinked my eyes and all of a sudden I was headed south toward Rosalia. I braved the crosswind, not letting my spirits get carried away in any sort of side manner. I made it to Rosalia with a few more cyclist meet-and-greets tucked away in my fanny pack. I stopped in and ate at the Old Hat Cafe where I was told my more than a couple of people that they cooked the best burgers in the state and the lady there was as sweet as could be, talking about how she raised her own cattle and cut her own meat. The burgers had no preservatives in them and they were 100% natural beef. I have to admit that the burger was very good but I didn’t get to enjoy the company of the sweet lady and got to talk with Cowboy Jim about politics and raising cattle and cutting the hooves on goats and teaching his kid how to play sports(“sports that most city boys don‘t get to play, like football and baseball“) I didn‘t understand that logic but went along listening being that I didn‘t have much of an option. He was a fun guy who had a zest for life and really had a good head on his shoulders when it came to family and the more important things; I could have done without the politics, but I still got a kick out of his kicks.
I made it to Highway 54 and hopped on the wind wagon heading east and found where the elevation dropped tremendously. I coasted for a total of six miles on three to four different hills that had me hollerin’ out to the world like some cowboy whose horse was buckin’ and broncin’ in a fit and frenzy.
I pulled into Eureka and found the city park where I set up camp. A lady pulled up and told me if I had been a bit earlier, I could have taken a dip in the pool. I was set up by that point and too tired to worry too much and thanked her anyway. Without the provisions of the pool, I laid down in my tent in my own filth . I didn't put up the rain flap seeing that the sky was clear and I read some of my book before staring at the sky. Aside from the stars, the fireflies were blinking on and off like a silent chorus, playing a song in their flashes, putting me to sleep with a concert of crickets humming in the background.
This post is dedicated to Old Chicago Restaurant in Conway, AR and my friends within
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