insane few days

So I know I haven't reported about our travels in a few days, but it's been pretty hectic. My cousin David Strosberg gave me a call on july 2nd and told us that he would pick us up in his plane and fly us over to Chicago so we can hang out there on the 3rd and 4th. Wyatt and I were pretty excited to get to a city and also fly in the small plane. We realized that we had to go pretty far west so that we didn't lose any time. So what we did was bike 175 miles in 20 hours so that when we go back to where we left in Missouri we wouldn't be behind our schedule. That was some of the most intense riding we've ever done. We rode through the night and cross the Mississippi River on one of the narrowest bridges i've been on. It got a little scary when a semi came behind us before we were halfway across. Our lives flashed before our eyes, but thank goodness the driver saw all our strobe lights on our bike and just went slow behind us. Also, Wyatt almost got hit by a deer as he was riding. It gets a little crazy in the midwest!

We arrived in Missouri in a very small town and stopped at a gas station. This small town apparently didn't have much of a night life because when we got to the gas station, there was about 20 drunk kids just hanging out. I started talking to this one really nice girl who asked about what we were doing. Before I knew what was happening, she had all her drunk friends donating money. It was really sweet. We slept for about 2 hours in someones yard, then biked to the airport where we met David Strosberg. David is a great guy who biked with us a bit then flew us back to Chicago.

In Chicago, David let us stay in his awesome apartment downtown and then we just explored. I saw an old friend that goes to Northwestern and then some friends that we met at the beach in North Carolina. It was nice to walk around the city. There is one thing that we have found out though...our bodies are not meant for walking. We get sore from walking a few miles, but we can bike hundreds of miles. It's about 6:30 am and we're about to head back on the plane to MIssouri, then continue our bike trip from where we left off.

We have a pretty hectic 2 days ahead of us before we get to Kansas. It could get a little brutal and I think some nightriding will be necessary. Halfway point is sometime today or tomorrow! I'll report in again in Kansas!!