Day 30: 
I woke up at 5:20 to the smell of bug spray. I sat up to find Ellen spraying bug spray everywhere. Also apparently a thunderstorm had rolled through. I set my tent under the pavilion so I didn’t hear or get wet despite leaving my rainfly off. Brent set his tent up in the grass and hardly got any sleep. I received many more bug bites when trying to pack up my stuff. You would think the corpses of their brethren on my arms and legs would deter them from attacking me. I cannot wait to get to Colorado where there are no mosquitos and less humidity. We had a tail wind in the morning and we went 63 miles taking a break after 30. From there on every town was about 20 miles apart. Two towns later (around 1:30) we stopped for lunch. It didn’t even feel like we went 100 miles. The tailwind was doing wonders for our mileage. Everyone was also in good spirits in the morning which helped. At 8 miles to the next town the road was starting to get to me. We had spent the last 100 miles on the same road without turning and I was getting rather antsy. I called my mom to pass the time and the next 30 minutes flew by. At the diner we had lunch with a father and daughter team who are also heading west. They aren’t going as fast as us so we probably won’t ride with them very far. We also saw a lot of people headed east. I think the count was 12 people. I felt bad for them as they were fighting a headwind.

After lunch the next town was 24 miles away. It was back on the same road again. Literally nothing was around me except farms. I was wrong about Kansas. It’s not all corn. There’s soybeans too. At mile 17 I could see the water tower of the town. I turned on some fall out boys and that helped elevate the boredom. Finally we got there and I could feel myself mentally crashing. Everyone wanted to push for more miles so I didn’t want to be that person to say ‘no more’. I wasn’t physically tired but being on the same road with nothing around was really getting to me. It was another 20 to the next town. This time these green crickets covered the road. They kept jumping on my legs and clinging to my handlebar bag. It was weird. There were thousands of them covering the road. It was impossible to ride without squishing them. Again I called my parents because I was going crazy. I’m giving them a huge shoutout for listening to me rant about whatever I was. I don’t even remember what I was talking about. With 10 miles left I started getting this ‘oh my goddess’ feeling and I wasn’t going to make it. I would have happily laid down on the side of the road and fell asleep. There was only one thing I could do. And it’s called caffeine. I ate 3 awake granola bars which each have 1/2 cup of coffee. Within minutes an enormous burst of energy came over me and I zoomed to Tribune Ks where we planned to regroup. 

At the gas station we debated on what to do. It was 15 miles to the Colorado border and then another 15 miles to a campground. We gained an hour today when we crossed into mountain time so it was only 5:30. 30 more miles would have been totally doable for me, especially since I was so pepped up on caffeine. However everyone seemed pretty wiped out so we decided to end the day with 134 miles. Our biggest day so far. Home tonight is the city park. There was a pool but it was closed. We all took turned taking an ice cold shower. There’s a small chance of rain so I set up my tent under a large pavilion. The pavilion is larger than normal. It looks like one you find at a fairground for a rodeo. Luckily there’s a fan so it’s not too hot!