You Don't Need a Weatherman To Know . . .

That the weatherman is rarely right. As I mentioned yesterday, the forecast was for rain most of the day today. Riding was going to be iffy today. When we woke up the skies were gray and the roads were wet but there was no rain. We decided to leave our hotel at 9:15. Claudia was going to drive us to Elmdale and Thom and I were going to get as close to Missouri as possible.

Speaking of hotels I have to say we have seen a wide variety of places. Our current hotel, is one of the less desirable places we have stayed in. I can't decide what annoys me more the poor craftsmanship, the bathroom and room door that don't latch closed unless you really work on it, the noise from the hall or Thom's story about the people in the room adjoining his trying to open the common door at 10:30PM. The rankings of the hotel and the cost seem to have no bearing on the quality of the hotel,

So we started in Elmdale and rode passed the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve. It was quite pretty but I must admit we didn't stop at the visitor center. In Council Grove we turned onto the Flint Hills Nature Trail. 

 

It was beautiful and quite relaxing riding on a trail where we only saw 2 other people for about 15 miles. We saw two deer, which surprisingly is the first wildlife we have seen while riding. I was looking forward to writing about this being the beginning of a new stage of the ride where we spend the majority of the time on bike paths separated from the roads. Unfortunately we found the trails better suited for gravel bikes than our road bikes, so we turned off the path and returned to the roads. In eastern Kansas that means roads that have rollers because of the Flint Hills. It was a lot of up and down. Nothing like the climbs in the west but a lot of hills.

We met Claudia in Osage City. The ride was almost 67 miles. Not bad for what was supposed to be a rainy day. We were tired and hungry when we pulled into Marilyn's Place. The chicken fried steak tasted real nice. Here is the ride on Strava:

 

PROGRESS

Wait the table is coming soon, first I need to tell you that May is bicycle month.  There is a national bike challenge. Thom and I are ranked number 1 and 2 in Rhode Island and in the top ten nationally. Also the New England Tour de Cure has an activity challenge Thom and I are ranked number 1 and 2 there as well. Now the table:

TOMORROW

The forecast says rain. We shall see. If it doesn't rain there is a chance we may finally make it to Missouri.

Remembering John.