Day 298
In 283 miles turn left
So let’s talk wind. OK I know I may have mentioned the W word a bit much recently but honestly, Kansas with a head wind is hell. Apparently it is much worse than normal at the moment, well fancy that, aren’t we the lucky pair to get extra wind!
We had stayed 2 nights in Great Bend, to avoid 45mph gusts, to rest up and enable Tom to edit a film and upload one he had prepared earlier, calm yourself #happycyclechick! It didn’t work out unfortunately as the promised great WiFi was virtually non-existent. Tom was not a happy bunny. Fortunately it did at least have decent food, first Leann’s diner, then bang next to our motel was Braum’s, a burger and ice cream diner. A few days back Bruce had offered to take us for an ice-cream at the local Braum's, the farm and dairy where it all started are based near Minco where Bruce lives. We were too full to take advantage of his generosity but made up for it last night. It was definitely worth the wait, and as usual they loved our accent so we had a great chat with Cheyanne our server.
Then it was back on the road. The screen on the Garmin advised me to bear right in 283 miles. Clearly it was going to be an interesting ride. The W was in our faces and clearly wasn’t going anywhere. We felt as if we weren’t either. 5 hours later we had covered a pitiful 30 miles. We had reached Rush Centre, the first place to stop, it had the usual petrol station-cum-shop-cum-diner. As expected the owner was wonderful and the customers ready for a chat. They cheerfully took the piss out of us and wished us a breezy afternoon! Just as we left they advised us of a tourist attraction not to be missed in the town of Alexander. First of all when I use the word town it needs to be understood that there is a sign post telling us we are in a town called, for this instance Alexander.That’s about it for most towns in Kansas. Maybe a grain processing plant, a house or two, and, well that’s it. Alexander though has more, wait for it, it has a rest area, car park with picnic tables to you and me, and very pretty it was too, but the main attraction and the reason we stopped was because it also has a public convenience. It’s heated, warm in winter with cool air in summer. The same lady has looked after it for 11 years, and wonderful woman that she is, she insisted on cleaning it before I went in. Seriously it was housed in a very smart building, with lots of tourist information, we were tempted to see if she would let us camp up for the night but the forecast was appalling, not only more W, but also it was going to be a very cold overnight and into the morning. So our plans to camp under a bridge or somewhere had been abandoned and if we could make Ness City, a total ride of 63 miles we were going to book into it’s only motel. Please note, when somewhere is called city it means 2 processing plants, a takeaway and petrol station. Our home for the night is the Derrick Inn. It’s an awesome place, a 2-storey motel built around an indoor swimming pool, restaurant, gym and bar. All of this inside a sort of large shed. It is undergoing major renovations, but the staff could not have been kinder, making us up a room, giving a discount and of course chatting about our accent and trip. The takeaway is across the carpark. It’s just perfect!
