July 17

 69 miles to Plainville, Kansas

We set the alarm to get up for 5:40am totally forgetting that we entered the Central Time Zone yesterday - so sunrise was not until 6:30am.  So we packed up, made some instant hot oatmeal for breakfast and hit the road at 6:40am.

It turned out to be a really difficult day.

    1. The road looked like a giant piece of ribbon candy; wavy, rolling hills all day.

    2. 2200 feet of climbing elevation.

    3. A nasty headwind of 15-20mph was with us all day.  We often had to pedal the downhills just to                    maintain a speed of 8-10 mph.

    4. The sun was shining bright all day, topping out at 94 degrees.

We stopped at a convenience store at mile 32 in Hill City to refill our drinks.  We stopped again at mile 53 in the town of Palco at a small grocery/deli.  There we each got a sandwich and more drinks.

These small towns we're passing through are in sad shape.  They look like they were populated, popular places years ago (judging by the number of structures).  But now most of the buildings are empty and boarded up and few residents remain.  All the towns we passed through the last 2 days have a population under 200.

We saw this abandoned place along the side of the road and stopped just to get out of the sun for a few minutes.  Funny that it's called "Fonzies".