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Monday, July 7, 2008

"5 racist hags, 4 Buzz's girls..." - Day 14

Travis didn't bring a sleeping bag, so he has been using the rain fly for our tent as a sleeping bag. As a result, I woke up in the middle of the night to rain hitting my face. So Travis had to forgo his blanket as we quick like bunnies threw the rain fly over the tent. It rained pretty hard for a while, but I still slept well.

In the morning, we bid farewell to Luke and Jason, only to run into them again at the gas station where we refilled our water. We set off down I-90 at breakneck speed, taking Luke and Jason's suggestion that we try drafting off of each other. Our average was running about 18 mph on a slight downhill with a slight tailwind. We were taking one mile pulls but I was tiring and thus Travis started taking 2 for my 1. We made the 41 miles to Kadoka in less than 2.5 hours, but got waylaid there because the bathrooms were out of order.
After half an hour or so in Kadoka, Luke and Jason pulled in. We coerced them into riding with us, thinking that it would be great to draft behind such sizable men. They agreed and so we set off with a four person train to Murdo. Travis ended up pulling the four of us across South Dakota at a pace that left Jason and me wondering what we'd gotten ourselves into. It as all I could do to keep up on the downhill and I was exhausted by the time we pulled into Murdo for a late lunch.
Entering Central Time with Luke and Jason

There, we bid Luke and Jason a final (maybe?) farewell and continued east. The whole day I was trying to coordinate with my dad when and where we were going to meet him, as he is flying up to ride with us for a day or two. He ended up flying to Chamberlain, which would've made for a 160 mile day for us. However, we were too tired to make it and settled to meet in the middle in Kennebec, another 40 miles down I-90.
Naturally, the final 20 miles were done at an exceedingly slow pace, but we passed the time by coming up with our own lyrics to the 12 Days of Christmas song. So far we have:
On the 5th day of riding my country gave to me:
5 racist hags,
4 Buzz's girls,
3 free beers,
2 obliterated turtles,
and a pig roast in Arvada, Wyoming!
We hope to have all 12 figured out so that we can sing it in the Atlantic.

At any rate, we pulled into Kennebec around 9 pm where my dad already had a room at Gerry's Motel. We showered, which was great, and really surprising how dirty the water falling at our feet became. We were treated to dinner and then went to bed. It looks like we're going to make it past Sioux Falls in two days and be in Des Moines in 4. We're also very nearly halfway finished. Wow.

TimeTripOdometerAverageMax
5:35:23
78.7
1101
14.0
?