Day 29 Hillsdale Lake to Council Grove

From Hillsdale Lake we got off pretty early after 2 cups oatmeal to get us the 20+ miles to Ottawa, where we would get a proper breakfast.

Ottawa didn't have a lot to offer, but it was the first sort of pioneer-esque town we came upon. The restaurant that was by chance recommended to us, Maria's Mexican, turned out to be fantastic and we were in love with the burritos and mexican bread. Maria made our food as we looked over the walls decorated with lots of pictures, posters, articles and knickknacks of both Mexican origin and US Marine Corps. Apparently almost all of her family, including daughter, are Marines. (We have a picture of this restaurant but I can't get this computer to load right now.)

It was another 30 miles to Osage, and this was the first time we saw some of the flatness of Kansas. We rode over a bicycle prohibited bridge without dying thankfully (hopefully that won't happen often or ever again), and got onto some pavement that was the color of a well-loved basketball, for some reason I enjoyed looking at the road for this bit.

As we rode, we could see many weather systems forming in this vast sky, we thought we were sort of missing the storm, but then drops began to fall, so we stopped, got out our rain gear and rode a bit further. Then the rain stopped, we got hot, stopped, undressed, and then in another 500 feet this occurred again. A man actually stopped to ask us if we were ok. By the time we were in Osage, we were wet with sweat and rain and ready for some food.

We stopped at their library where we tried to get stuff done, but the computer I was assigned to was right next to where they were showing Spider Man 3, and I have absolutely no resistance to TV. So I wrote some sentences every once in a while, while I soaked the seat a bit with my wet clothes (Sorry!), and Andy and I got chilled. So after a bit, we gave up, and decided to eat, again.

Osage has no privately owned restaurants so we ended up eating at Pizza Hut. Apparently it was started in Kansas in 1958 by some brothers in Wichita, so we didn't feel too bad. It was sort of a local meal (100 miles maybe). The waiter Jordan let us load up on the salad bar for nothing since we had been some of their only customers for the day (it was about 3 by now), and told us about how he had just moved from Kansas City, MO to have a kid, buy a house, and practically give up (my words, not his) his artistic carreer as a graffiti artist, DJ, and musician. We hope he can cultivate an artistic culture in Osage. From the figures he was telling us, as far as cost goes, it would be an artist's dream! We exchanged some info, and headed off into the rain, another 40 miles to Council Grove.

The rain, which kept us cool, came and went all day. It was wonderful to watch the sky's clouds forming and rolling, and not circling. We saw some vast landscapes that I just can't even imagine. I am pretty in love with them, although they certainly came with some hills. Lots of them actually. This 40 mile stretch of land was anything but flat, which gave you the best views when you would reach the top and see everything. Pretty cool.

We stopped for snacks at a track at high school and a man pulled over in his "Bike Mobile" (labelled by his kids on the front liscense) and offered us a ride to Council Grove. We declined, but talked to him for a bit. His wife has biked across the state 10 times with about 1200 other bikers (can you imagine?) and he does some himself. A retired farmer, he looked pretty worn and there were big globs of eye boogers hanging around the corners of his lids. He said it had just been too hard and he had given it up, and seemed to be desperately trying to get his wife to stop working too so they could enjoy doing nothing for a while.

We rolled into Council Grove, pretty exhausted, grumpy, and pulling at each other a little bit. We stopped at this manmade lake, Council Grove Lake or something, and camped. They had several campsites and our conversation with the attendant we finally found was a bit complicated and round about, but we eventually got the information and price we needed.

The campsite itself was nice and secluded next to some Juniper trees, so after cooking our last Trader Joe's purchases, we showered (nice HOT water pressure! GO Army Core!), and went to bed, risking leaving the tent un-raincovered so that we might enjoy the stars. Our luck was with us today.