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Neil, one of our support crew, is from Lyons, Kansas. It just happened that we had our one sag stop of the day in Lyons, at the Rice County courthouse. We all wore the flag-patterned America By Bicycle jerseys, and paraded into town with a police escort. At the courthouse, the former mayor and some of the local ladies provided cinnamon buns and soft drinks. Nice little town, that. Then we got a tour of the local grain elevator. We don't have them in Massachusetts, so it was a bit of an education. It really does seem to be an array of silos. The grain is dumped into an underground bin. A continuous belt of cups carries it to the top, where it gets dumped into one of the silos. That's pretty much all there is to it. They're currently storing mostly wheat. They'll clear that out over the next couple months to make room for the corn and milo. Those three crops are most of what they grow around here. After that long interlude, the rest of the day's biking went very quickly, and we got in at noon. There was a bit of a tailwind, and there wasn't much else to see. We did see one farmer burning the wheat straw, to quickly clear the field for the next planting. Neil's father-in-law (father of his late wife) died today. It just happens that this happened 30 miles from here, so he doesn't have to fly home, but it's a strain on him just the same, and he's away this evening. Route rap turned into another knock-down drag-out fight, this time about hydration and support. 9 riders spent half an hour at the museum in Lyons, and were completely unsupported for the rest of the day. They ran out of water, and eventually asked a farmer. Bruce (the tour leader) said he went all the way back, but didn't see them. Bruce's point was that people should tell him when they're going off the route, which is well taken. Yesterday, Andy and I went off the route to see Pawnee Rock. It took about half an hour, 13 miles from the end of the route, so we were back on the road for about 50 minutes, and the van could have missed us. We should have phoned the van when we decided to go off route. However, today's case was different. It was 33 miles from the end, they were on the road for 2½ hours, and the van still managed to miss them. Furthermore, at least one rider told Bruce she was going to the museum, and at least one other rider reported to the staff that there were people back at the museum, so he had some clues about where to look. Bud (who is a very fast rider) reports that the van has beaten him to the hotel every day for the last three days, when it should be out sweeping the road. We're getting into some 100+ degree days, and some long mileages (108 miles on Saturday, and 89 miles on Sunday), and we're going to need better support. After route rap, 15 riders (half the group) stayed for half an hour to discuss the situation. This is not just a couple of disgruntled riders, but Bruce doesn't seem to be listening. Suggestions were made to leave water jugs along the route, but he's not going for it. He says that people steal the big 10-gallon dispenser jugs, but we could do it with 1-gallon jugs from the supermarket. We get reports that Doug (the owner) thinks they're spending too much on gas and mileage. The cellphones (one per vehicle) don't have call waiting or voice-mail, and sometimes aren't turned on, or aren't in the vehicles. This makes communication difficult. The message we're getting is that we have to look out for ourselves, and can't count on support from the support vehicles. This is what $5000 buys us. By the way, this is where Andy failed utterly to find beer, even though there was a bar across the street, and a gas station with beer right next to it. |
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