Day 31, June 18th 2008, beginning in Woodward, Oklahoma

All business again, we pounded the pavement at torrid pace. We were looking at another 100+ mile day and a new state. As we were leaving Woodward, I noticed a sign on a motel. It had nothing to do with the motel, which was great, but an amazing quote nonetheless… and appropriate. "…everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you're climbing it." Nice, right? Gave a nice feel to the ride.

As we continued through the sparsely populated area, we noticed another humorous sign. I'm a bit upset I didn't get a picture, but apparently the "not so high security" prison in the area had some escapee issues. The sign read "don't pick up hitchhikers they may be escaping inmates". I thought that was comical. As if they were in the act… I don't know just worded a bit funny.

Buffalo Oklahoma would be our last stop in the state, and a good choice. We rolled up to an all you can eat pizza buffet. We met a couple guys there that we talked to for a while whose profession was to follow storms and do repairs on dented cars after the hail had done its damage. Funny, the different opportunities in different areas of the country. We filled our water bottles with the best ice ever. Small chunky ice, like riverside restaurant in Bristol for those of you who know. Oh its so good. I've never appreciated water and ice so much as I do now.

As we checked the map, it appeared that Sitka, Kansas would be our next stop, about 25 miles away. The next stop after that would be another 25 as the towns were growing even fewer and farther in between. The gps didn't show too much development in Sitka, but there were signs for it 27 miles away so we figured there had to be at least a gas station.

The day prior, I said to Paul “if Oklahoma is so windy, why don't they have more wind generators?”.  Sure enough, as we approached the border we could see a line of them for miles. It's pretty neat how far away you can see things when there are no building to block your sight.  It took us a good 10 miles to reach them, and they were massive.

Yeah, about Sitka… Wrong. We would have to do a 52 mile stretch with no refreshments. Yikes. And southwestern Kansas is not as flat as you might imagine.

It turns out Bucklin would be where we would land. When we finally saw humans, we did a little dance (in our heads). We stopped at a small grocer and got about 5 pounds of grapes. They were quite juicy and a good choice. We also got some ice cream. At this point we reserved a spot in a campground in Dodge City.

There were reports of storms ahead. They must have contributed to the winds we received on the way in, some sort of pressure thing. We traveled nearly 20 mph the whole way in. When we stopped to get a bite in Subway, more people had warned us of the bad storms coming. We also noticed a cheap motel on the way in, and when we put two and two together, we nixed the camping idea. Getting good at the motel bargaining, especially on weekdays, I was able to talk the manager down a whole 200 pennies! Patting myself on the back, I felt like the ultimate negotiator.

We settled down and showered up to prepare ourselves for Colorado! Woooo. We couldn't wait, we were looking forward to Colorado the most. It would probably be the most challenging, as we would soon find out John Denver was not full of it, but also the most happening.

With mountains to conquer in our future, we slept feeling as strong as the Titans (good simile?). Let's do it.

Life was good.