Wandering Retirees

Connie here. Hank is taking  full advantage of the rest day. 

Today we hung out at our lodging in the small town of Walsenburg, CO. It was a day for napping. And some laundry. It feels good to have some clean clothes again. 

Speaking of clothes, many have asked us what we take on our long trips. The truth is: only what we need.  We each have one side case in which to fit our clothing. We use packing cubes to compress everything so we can carry enough. Enough is a relative term but we make do. We each have clothing to hike in, ride in, swim in and sleep in.  As you may have guessed socks and underwear are high priority.  With the wind brought by speed, we can wear stinking clothes without being obnoxious! 😂

We have a bag for the top case (like a trunk on a car). In there we keep communal items like a mini kitchen with bowls, sporks, knife and dish soap; a laundry kit with laundry soap, Tide sticks and laundry lines to hang up clothing after washing; a first aid kit, meds, pain relievers and such. We have a compact backpack that fits in its own pocket to that we use for grocery shopping. 

We also carry rain jackets and warmer clothing for layering. At altitude in the Rockies it is cold and often there is snow on the ground. 

When we took our first cross country trip in 2017, we found ourselves thinking that even though we had so little we had enough. And it felt good. It felt like all the possessions at home were too much and unnecessary.  I try to remember this when I want to buy something else for the house. I’m not always successful in resisting the urge to accumulate things, but I don’t do badly. 

Tomorrow we head out to see the Great Sand Dune National Park and then on to see a friend of Hank’s from high school. Bruce and his wife Terri are opening their home to us for a couple of nights. We’re both looking forward to spending time with them. 

Good night and good luck. Thanks for following along. 

The road to Walsenburg, CO felt really long today. I had it my silly brain it was only 240 miles. Google Maps insisted it was 283, and Apple Maps said about 290. It was 315 miles with not very much of the things we take for granted at home. Fuel stops are 30 or more miles apart and you can’t be very fussy. There’s usually a convenience store attached with restrooms, snacks and cold drinks, though not often with a place to sit. We enjoyed our lunchtime peanuts and cold drinks leaning on an ice cream freezer next to the register. We got some looks and a couple of nibbles of conversation but that’s all.

We are again struck by how vast and beautiful our country is. Our route took us mostly on US 160, a nicely maintained two lane road. If you look at a map, you’ll see that the road is straight as an arrow until you meet a junction where you make a turn (or not) and drive straight again. There is precious little traffic except the occasional grain truck, oil/gas carrier and cattle truck.

Grain, energy and ranching pretty much describes the economy we saw here. Huge fields (like miles long) are planted with corn, wheat, soy and alfalfa. Great irrigation booms are connected to substantial pumps that draw water from the aquifer and turn semi arid land a vibrant green. Gas and oil wells abound as do huge solar and wind farms that take advantage of the open ground and prevailing winds. We passed miles of aromatic feed lots where cattle are fattened then trucked to market.

What we didn’t see a lot of were houses and people. Many small towns we rode through had seen better days. Empty and closed stores tell a tale of relocation, maybe due to a search for paying work elsewhere. It seems a lot of folks in rural west Kansas and southeastern Colorado are just getting by. Which is a shame. We depend on farms and farmers to feed our 340 million people. Just saying.

Early on today we stopped at a huge grain co-op that loads hopper rail cars some of which were already on the siding, maybe waiting to be filled. This scene was repeated dozens of times today. Again, the scale of food production beggars the imagination.

What also caught our attention was a 50’ tower with a tornado warning siren. The tower had its own junction box and transformer. Tornados are serious business here.

That’s all we have for tonight. Tomorrow is a down day for laundry and lounging. Probably not in that order.

Be well, and thanks for following along with us!

Dodge City, KS was our goal today. Made it, too! A shortish run of 240 miles on mostly secondary roads. The terrain is striking on these rolling plains. After the densely populated area we’re from, it still surprises how open it is. Homesteads are sometimes miles apart amid vast fields of corn, soy, alfalfa and wheat. Rest stops, convenience stores and gas stations are always farther away than you think. Ask us how we know. Hard to cross your legs on a bike.

And Big Sky. It’s hard to describe the immensity of the open sky here with no mountains or hills to limit your view. Today, Connie remarked when looking at the clouds she had the feeling the clouds were physically heavy and weighing down on us. We feel a change in perspective under the pressure of so much space.

On the way we saw hundreds of huge wind turbines generating power for the state. The Spearville Wind Farm alone is listed as having 99 turbines. Considering the constant, often forceful wind on the plains, this seems an awesome way to utilize a vast energy resource.

Dodge City is a neat place in our history. Remember Gunsmoke? Frontier justice with characters played by James Arness (extra credit if you know the name of his famous brother), Amanda Blake, Ken Curtis and Dennis Weaver.

If you do you’re old. If you don’t, you still might be old.

I remember coming here on a family vacation in the 60’s and seeing Boot Hill, and reenactments of famous shootouts with Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday and Bat Masterson, where desperados were shot and expired while falling dramatically from roof tops and storefronts. Very exciting for an eight-year-old at the time. You can still see it at the Boot Hill Museum.

Dodge City was also a hub for massive cattle drives out of Texas in the late 1800’s. Ranching is still big here.

Tomorrow we head into Colorado and then a day of rest. And laundry. Maybe a nap.

Hope you enjoy your night. Maybe stream an episode of Gunsmoke or whatever. Talk to you tomorrow.

PS. The famous brother was Peter Graves who starred in Mission Impossible.

Hello, from Junction City, Kansas. Our 260 miles took us north of Kansas City (MO and KS), through Topeka and Acheson along US Routes 39, 59 an I-70. The rolling hills and steep mini-canyons are striking landscapes as we rode beyond the Missouri River into the Prairie.

Here’s a fun fact: many secondary highways have the route number with a sunflower. 🌻

It’s easy to imagine that these grasslands have been home to people for thousands of years. The Konza Prairie Biological Station is a preserve owned by the Nature Conservancy and Kansas State University that covers 8500 acres of tall grassland. The station, established in 1971, is named for the Kaw or Kanza people who inhabited this land for centuries before being forcibly removed between 1846 and 1872. The station also tries to honor the legacy of their culture, while doing ecological research, teaching and Prarie’s conservation as our climate changes.

We rolled into town just before some bad weather swept in. It’s amazing how dramatic storm clouds look with “big sky” as a backdrop. Junction City is home to a large Army base, Fort Riley, which swells the local population of about 23,000. A number of soldiers are currently housed in our hotel for an extended stay.

There’s not a lot more to say about our day. Supper comes from whatever grocery store is nearby, and usually features a salad, some kind of protein, and maybe a sweet treat. The glutes are holding up with stretching, exercise and generous doses of ibuprofen and Aleve.

We are grateful for your interest, and the comments are very welcome. Please keep them coming. ☺️

And a shower sounds about right.

Have a good night!

We’re writing from Marceline, MO, a small railroad town of about 2200 people, and most famously the hometown of Walt Disney. Who reportedly used Marcine as a model for Main Street at Disney Land.

The Best Western we were booked in had no rooms when we arrived. Seems the reservation Connie made in April didn’t get from Hotels.com to Best Western. The front desk there was very helpful, however, and got us last minute reservations and we are comfortably ensconced in this cozy Hotel Marcine.

We covered about 300 miles today on fairly empty, straight roads. There’s no help for it if we want to make some tracks.

The mighty Mississippi separates from Illinois from Missouri.

We stopped in Hannibal, MO, home to Samuel L Clemens, aka, Mark Twain. Hannibal has not missed a trick where it comes to marketing their famous son. His name is emblazoned on every kind of establishment, from schools to shops to diners.

At the River Front Park, there’s a replica paddle steamer giving scenic tours up and down the Mississippi. While there, we encountered Bob and Lera, both in their 90’s who were out for a stroll. Bob is 94 and at least 6’-4”, slender and still very rugged and strong. His handshake left no doubt of that. Bob shared that he grew up and farmed land just across the river along the Illinois shore for 50 years or more, and contracted for work with the USDA. He and Lera sold the farm some years ago when it became too much and came across to Missouri. But they still come to the river.

Since it was lunch time, we took a recommendation and went to … the “Mark Twain” Dinette, famous for their Maid-Rite sandwiches.

On the way in, we met Peter Vredenburgh, a rider who is a retired lumber mill owner from near Springfield, IL. He is not a long distance rider like we are, but he’s managed to rack up 100,000+ miles since 2020. We shared lunch together and had a great time swapping stories of family and riding. The special every day are Maid-Rite burgers made with chopped burgers, onions, pickles and mustard, on a soft steamed roll. They were surprisingly good. Pete grew up with a Maid-Rite shop close by, so this is a sentimental favorite stop.

We had fun today, meeting some kind people and sharing a bit of life. Made it easier to live with our still-sore-butts. 😉

Tomorrow, it’s off to Kansas. For now, we bid you good night.

It’s been a couple of days since we last posted. We spent two nights with our son and his wife, Ben and Aabha in Canonsburg, PA. It was marvelous being with the grands, Lucas and Baby Liam. And the parents, too. Can’t forget them.

We rode to just outside of Columbus, OH to visit dear friends, Frank and Shanti, who have recently moved from our area to be near their grandkids. We had a great time visiting and taking the tour of the attractions around town. And their new home is lovely, backing up to a golf course.

This morning we began the serious ride to Colorado and put on 320 miles along I-70 and I7-74 to Champaign, IL. We decided to forgo the secondary roads in order to get to the Rockies in the shortest time. Not our usual MO because it’s not as much fun and tiring, but we think it’s a good trade. We’ll probably keep to this plan until we reach the Colorado Plateau. Physically we’re doing pretty well at acclimatizing our seats. Our exercise regimen is paying off so that we don’t actually fall off the bike when we try to get off. Creak and groan maybe.

Champaign is in central IL and hosts the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, home of the Fighting Illini. Like most college towns, Champaign is looking pretty empty now that summer is here. Lodgings are easily had these days and the halls are quiet. That’s really pretty okay with us. 😎

For supper we stopped at a Meijers grocery and bought bag salad and a rotisserie chicken. Nice and easy to fix in our room, and it’s tasty. We also bought fixings for breakfast so we’re all set. It’s all relatively cheap and keeps us going without breaking the budget.

Well, enough for one night. Thanks for checking in on us. It means a lot!

Have a good night!

We started out early (think “retired early” – maybe 8:30] on our way west toward Colorado, one of our favorite places to ride. Our first stop is in Canonsburg where our son Ben’s family has set up shop. Very exciting doings here. Baby Liam is growing like a weed, and big brother Lucas just got fitted for hockey gear for learning to play today.

Our ride was not very exciting. 320 miles out the Pennsy Turnpikeas quick as we could. And only about $50 with EZ Pass. Such is progress.

We encountered a couple of folks who brightened the day. At a rest area west of Harrisburg we were resting our butts when we met a woman with three Corgeys. She was having a wonderful time watching her pups whiz around inside her car. We assume it’s her car. Not sure what she was thinking but she was sure having fun. Whatever floats your boat, I guess. It just stuck with me.

Then I met Tom on his big beautiful Harley and we got to talking. Of course we did the obligatory mutual admiration of our rides and shared a story or two. He told a tale of a friend of his that loved long rides. Really long. He did a trip from PA to Washington State then made a “detour” to Alaska. I mean, why wouldn’t you? Seattle to Fairbanks is only about 2,200 miles. Seems he had little in the way of gear, yet had thought to install a reserve fuel tank in one of his saddle bags. Wouldn’t it be invigorating to ride with a tank of 93 Octane fuel under your butt. But then, why wouldn’t you? What could possibly go wrong? According to Tom all was right at the end. There was no self immolation.

Sounds like a tall tale, but well told.

As I’m writing this we are planning an outing at the Pittsburgh Zoo and ice cream at Sarris’ Candy Shop, one my favorite places to get fat.

More tomorrow. And thanks for checking in!