Saturday, 8/1/81
Norton, KS rest area
Bad day today. Only made 62 miles. between the hills and the strong wind and the 95° humid heat. Anyone who says Kansas is flat has an argument with me! Northern Kansas is nothing but hills. I never had lunch. I stopped for the day where I'd planned to stop for lunch. It was so hot. I sat under a tree reading until 7:00 PM. A Christian vagabond and odd-job type old man started talking tome and didn't quit till I left the next morning.
I also met John, a 30-year-old blond bearded New Englander who's lived on the Yucatan Peninsula and was now cycling the U.S. A tremendous thunderstorm struck at dusk. I paid John 50¢ to walk during the worst of it 200 feet from our shelter and back. He took off all but his shorts and did it. Then a lightning bolt hit the water tower over our heads.
The storm cooled the temperature like an air conditioner and I had my first good sleep since Denver.
I should explain about Kansas. Since there are very few scenic
areas in the state, there are very few campgrounds and, as a consequence, they
let you camp in their rest areas., which occur every 30 miles on all major
highways. This makes the state extremely popular with bicyclists, who will take
a free camp anywhere they can get it. The only problem is that rest areas,
unlike private campgrounds in normal states, do not provide showers. Therefore,
bicyclists don’t take any. Enough said.
I wrote more about my fellow campers in the narrative I wrote at the end of the trip:
That night, I camped in a rest area at the town of Norton. I
shared it with two other travelers. The first was a man in his late forties who
apparently made his living by traveling the mid-west in a dilapidated car and
trailer painting signs for people—rather repainting signs suffering from the
extreme weather there. He was a man of strong religious conviction and he was
surprised and perhaps insulted that I did not accept the religious pamphlet he
offered me. He was apparently very lonely too, as he followed me around like a
puppy dog, offering opinions on everything under the sun with the most genuine
convictions. By morning, I couldn’t move fast enough to leave him behind.
The other traveler was John, a cyclist who was going my way. He
was a 30-year-old blond New Englander who had spent the winter living in
Paradise on the Yucatan Peninsula, living on a beach eating cocoanuts and going
spear-fishing for dinner. Now he was bicycling home across America.
A massive thunderstorm was moving in so we repaired to a
restroom/information center building. The storm hit with the usual driving
sheets of rain, lightning, lighting up the neighborhood, and thunder crashing.
In the height of the thunderstorm, I offered John 50 cents if he’s stroll 200
feet to a picnic shelter and back. He didn’t even stop to think about it, he
just stripped off all his clothes but his shorts and went. When he go back, he
pulled out a towel and dried off and accepted my money. At least he got a
shower. Shortly afterward, a lightning bolt hit the water tower directly over
our heads. This time the thunder didn’t roll around. It just CRASHED same time as the lightning! It
was quite an experience. The storm passed but left air that was cooled as of by
an air conditioner. I had my first good night’s sleep since Denver.
Pretty crazy of us, looking back on it. But thunderstorms bring out the crazy in you--something about all those positive ions in the air. I don't think I ever heard anything so loud in my life as when that lightning hit the water tower over us. Maybe THAT's how I lost my hearing in one ear...
