Day 19 – 20 June 2014

Departed Cheyenne, WY around 6 am in clear but cold temperatures; 46 degrees. Had all my cold weather gear on but by 1000 am I had stopped three times to take off different gear until I was finally wearing only a long sleeve shirt and blue jeans. Final temperature was in the 90’s when I arrived in Salina, KS.

I hit Denver traffic just as it was picking up but managed to bypass most of the traffic and got on I-70 heading east towards Salina, KS. There is absolutely nothing to take a picture of on I-70 through Kansas. The only incident worth mentioning happened around Bellingham, CO. I was riding along about 75 mph and there were no cars close to me behind or in front. All of a sudden I hear a loud engine noise like a high powered sports car. I suspect someone is about to blast past me on the highway but I don’t see anything in my mirrors. All of a sudden a single engine retractable airplane flew over me with less than 40 feet clearance. I know this because I could clearly see the rivets in the wing. Scared the crap out of me. He wasn’t climbing and at first I thought he must be in trouble and about to crash or was intentionally flying very low. He finally started to climb but I suspect he did this on purpose; damn pilots.

I had little wind until around 12:30 then it picked up again like the last two days. I will never, ever and I mean never ride a motorcycle across the central states ever again; Kansas, Nebraska, South/North Dakota, east Montana, east Wyoming, west Oklahoma and Texas panhandle. There is nothing there worth seeing and the wind is hell. I’ve made that trip 4 times and every time I’m beat to hell by the wind. I swear I saw a cow bracing itself against a fence post so it wouldn’t get blown into Nebraska. I’m following a pick-up truck pulling a RV trailer and it looked like the right trailer wheel was coming off because it was at such an angle. The wheel was ok but the tire was bent at an angle due to the wind blowing against the side of the trailer. Freezing strong wind and rain in Montana, helmet sucking 35+ mph gusts in Wyoming and finally blast furnace wind from hell in Kansas. Kansas provided a special treat with its wind. Occasionally I would pass some kind of animal site (cows, pigs, chickens, mongooses, etc.) and the hot wind would then smell like crap. I’m through with these states. Enough said about that.

I did 522 miles today and went over 7000 total miles since I left for St Louis on 31 May. I will be in Tulsa area to visit folks and kids tomorrow and probably head to Little Rock on Monday. That will complete the AK2 adventure. After I get home I plan on doing all the statistics on fuel used, total costs, etc. I also plan on doing a complete gear review on all the items I took plus items I wish I had taken. Finally I will provide an accumulation of my thoughts and observations reference this trip. When you are on a motorcycle for 7000+ miles you have a lot of time to think and some of them may be of interest to others.