Day Twelve ; Boulder, CO - Dodge City, Kansas

Found in sweet shop, Boulder, CO

This was easily  THE WORST day of riding with special regards to the weather. It was also one of the most challenging and rewarding day's riding in it's own way. I was told after I leave the Rockies and head through Kansas it's going to be painfully boring, that it wasn't, but it was all 'downhill' after the Rockys, they were such a highlight and although I was well and truly clear of the desert, I was back in flat lands. Kansas is oceans of fields, speckled with oil pumps, barns and little villages. My goal was to reach Dodge City. As I left Colorado the skies opened and I start to get wet. 

Grey skies

I welcomed the rain because although it wasn't roasting, it was by no means a cold day, also I missed the feeling of rain. I got about 90 miles out of Boulder, refueled and got some food in my belly (it was a real old family owned diner with the family furniture used in the restaurant, no two cups the the same and a cup of day-old coffee poured for me before I'd even sat down). I put on some dry clothes (in the restaurant / family kitchen) and added my waterproofs. I ate a pretty tasty burger and as I left the diner, the storm started to catch up in all it's glory, it was following me. I was quick to eat and go but the rain I had left in Boulder had caught up. It was building momentum in size, speed and severity. The heavy drops started to hit as I drove out of the small town, another 80 odd miles of tolerable rain (which is now getting cold). I'm filling the tank again and in doing so the storm is only 10 minutes behind me. I try to enjoy a cigerette having fueled up but the cigarette is practically extinguished by what is now a storm. I'm forced to get back on the bike and try regain 1st place in this battle with Mother Nature. This continued the whole day long. Some pressure difference ahead of the storm was starting to lift all the dust and the next 200 miles proved even more difficult, during which I rode through heavy rain followed by thick dust cloud which turned me and my bike into a brown cake-like texture, as I pull into another gas station I'm considering calling it a day, I'd have to allow this cake mixture dry and crack it off all my gear and my bike. I don't stall and I decide to push on because I know this ground will have to be made up the next day en route Tennessee. 

After this I was treated to huge hailstones the size of marbles, they were hitting my shins and my chin (3/4 face helmet) and it was extremely painful, I was distracted by trying to ride in grooves in the hail on the road which had been created by truck tires. Little hailstone valleys of safe rideable tar. The winds were blowing the remaining rain sideways. 

The dust storm I had to escape

I drove at a 30 degree angle for a good length of that journey due to the unforgiving side wind. Anyone who has driven through Kansas will be all too familiar with side-winds. Oddly enough, the following rains seemed to clean me and my bike off again, my last refueling of the day my Shadow and I were both wet and clean. There's not much to remember about Kansas asides the flat harvested corn fields and barns but the smell was just a little off. 

Most Irish people know and love the smell of sileage spread on the fields (if they don't admit to loving it, they'd admit to it being an important smell of their growing-up). The smell of Irish cow shite is not offensive per se, most Irish people living outside of the Pale will admit to this smell being a very sentimental homely smell. Living in Dublin city, returning to Mullingar in the country side and getting a whiff of cow shite is a real welcome. It's just something we're used too, cow shite. Riding through Kansas was one of the few times when being able to access the smells of your surroundings was not necessarily a good thing, the one time A/C would have come in handy. Cow shite smells different in Kansas. I am passing multiple cattle feedyards where cows are fed all sorts of nasties. I have always known that these huge food corporations and such are pumping chickens and cows with chemicals but I didn't know their shit would smell that bad. What was worse was when I passed a slaughterhouse and the smell I gathered was familiar to me but I couldn't place it, it was a clinical smell, out of place, something hospital related! The slaughterhouse actually smelled like antibiotics, it was worrying to say the least considering I was riding passed the building at 80 mph and the odour was strong enough for me to pick up. I try to eat USDA approved meat from here on in on my trip. 

Bike was purchased with 10,000 miles

I made it to Dodge City and pulled into the first motel. The owners, a couple, were such sweet people. They lent me a USB adapter which I had needed since the start of my trip and then they tell me to keep it. The husband gave me a small bag of homemade jerky which he had made himself, it was absolutely delicious and comparable to the quality of biltong, African-style dried beef. His wife kindly offered to wash my clothes for a small fee of $5. Considering I got in at about 8pm she did fairly well having it at my door by 7am, still warm from the drier. I was so happy to have reached Dodge City. I know many would have called it a day and packed it in earlier but I just couldn't give up. The roads were terrifying but it gave me a boost. I spent most of the day on the highways before I inevitably hit some more interstate.

Lessons;
-Fuck Kansas
-The people are lovely