July 09, 2010 – Day 34 Soggy beginnings, Hot & Dry in Kansas City, MO

When I looked out the window this morning it was still raining hard, same as when I went to bed. The weather people were predicting rain all day if I wanted to stick around so I elected to leave. Before doing so I hit the motel’s buffet breakfast and topped off my cereal tank. One of their offerings was a bit out of the ordinary, hard boiled eggs in the shell. All the other places I’ve stayed at had them peeled so maybe these guys were saving labor dollars. I snagged one to go with my flakes and when I’d finished I went for another only to find the supply dried up. There’d been at least 8 in the serving container after I’d taken mine and only one gal had stopped in after that. She must have been hungry for boiled eggs. Maybe she’d watched Cool Hand Luke on the tube last night?

Soggy old Geezer

For a change I put on Big Red as it looked like I’d be in the muck most of the day and it’s more comfortable then the Frogg Toggs. I headed out highway 3 into the soggy countryside for the 314 mile run to Kansas City where David and his son Noah live. The rain began to let up a little after 10 miles or so and when I stopped for a photo of the Bottom Lands historic site it stopped too.

Soggy horses don't seem to mind the rain

The town of Red Bud was the last of the rainy spots and I knew I was getting out of the nasty stuff. The horizon still held clouds but they weren’t as black and they were fewer in numbers. Fine I thought, but I’m not going to take my rain gear off; that’s a sure invitation to another monsoon.

Main drag Red Bud

Turn left, stay on highway 3...I think

Shortly after Red Bud and after passing the little town of Waterloo I found myself on Interstate Highway 255, a rather major piece of slab-work heading more or less north. It seemed a bit odd as my memory was trying to tell me I should be heading in a westerly direction. The evening before I’d received an email from David saying to take my time getting to his place so I’d decided to set up a route taking me there on country roads and avoiding freeways. Granted my memory isn’t the greatest so trusting Garmin & Company I followed instructions like a dutiful son. Highway 255 carried me across the Missouri River and onto 270 which circumvented below St. Louis for which I was glad but still wondering how I’d got there.

Garmin has a nice feature built into their products; whenever you pass one of their turns it then displays how far it is to the next turn and when that indicated 205 miles I knew I’d been had. It was then I remembered I’d set up two routes to David’s; the first being a direct one as chosen by Garmin and after his email a second one taking me south of the freeways through small towns. It was obvious I’d selected the wrong one to follow and I was on the fast track to Kansas City.

By then I’d grown accustomed to the normal speed of 70 -75 mph and since there was little or no wind Green Girl was flying low. The semi-truck traffic was fairly low and overall it was easy riding so I decided to continue on. Freeways as a rule don’t offer much in the way of photo ops and since I’d decided to ride this one out I settled back, put Green Girl on cruise and relaxed.

I arrived at David’s a few minutes after 5:00pm and for a few minutes I engaged in a bit of confused but interesting entertainment. David had sent me the code to his alarm system in case I arrived and they were gone so when I rang the bell and no one answered I figured that’s what had happened. It was perfectly logical since his car was in the driveway. I checked around back and it was also vacant so I decided to bust in using the code. Nada, not going to happen Dude. I checked and rechecked the code but every time I entered it all I got was a flashing red light.

Next step, since he’s got a WIFI set up in his home I figured why not just sit out on the back deck with my notebook and catch up on the blog. I unpacked it and headed around back and moved a bench under the eve out of the hot sun. While I was doing this something kept nagging me at the back of my brain; his deck looked different than last year, it seemed smaller and none of the furniture was there. Then I noticed the house next door and it looked more like David’s stuff. Cupping my eyes I peered into the window on the deck and none of the furniture looked familiar either.

“Hmm, I wonder what’s going on.” I thought and I decided to go back out front for another inspection of things. There seemed to be someone home next door so I thought I’d ask if they knew when David and Noah would be home. As I walked past their open garage door I noticed they had a BMW motorcycle just like David’s and guess what? Small world but they also had a racing go-kart just like Noah’s…! I rang the bell and since I was a day early a surprised David answered. We had a good laugh about his car being parked in his neighbor’s driveway and I was grateful I hadn’t set his alarm off messing with the code.

For dinner fixings we went to a gourmet store where David bought Copper River Salmon and ingredients for a green salad and fresh strawberries. Being another of my friends skilled as a barbeque chef he cooked it plank-style and served it up hot. We also sampled a particularly nice treat I’d been fortunate to bring from Tennessee; all told it was great!

Life on the road….