Chalk up another one for Team Awesome!

Inside the Graham County Library in Hill City, Kansas, it's a comfortable 68 degrees, as it rages at over 100 degrees outside. It is for that reason that we woke up in time to hightail it from Luray this morning to Hill City by 1 PM to beat out the heat.

Last night we were in Luray, Kansas. All I have to say is that, when HBC South (hereafter referred to as Team Awesome) rolled into Luray, we immediately boosted the population of the town up by 8%. Some of us got to shower at The Roost, Luray's very own hunting lodge.

While HBC may seem to some like a daily grind where you get up, ride a ridiculous distance, and pass out on the other end, there's a lot of "variability" to the usual routine that comes with the whole package. Perhaps the best of the unexpected occurrences we've experienced so far happened yesterday.

I should preface this by introducing those of you who are new to HBC with the age-old tradition of the "Naked Mile." Every year, HBC inevitably finds itself on some remote back road where the only sound is the wind whipping through the hills and you see a car roughly once per hour. Such was the case yesterday, riding from Gypsum to Luray, and a group of about ten decided to drop trou and feel the breeze on bike for a solid mile.

So off go the gloves, the jersey, the spandex, everything but the helmet (safety first!) and the shoes. As we prepare to mount our bikes au naturel, we see a car in the distance about 2 miles behind us. We think nothing of it; there's usually at least one car that passes during the Naked Mile, no big deal. One person comments on how funny it would be if that was a cop car.

Within two minutes, we realize it IS, in fact, the county sheriff. Quickly we jump into a grassy ditch by the side of the road, our only cover. We scramble to put on our clothes again (in a fit of fury, I managed to put my spandex on inside out) as the officer rolls up and asks how we're doing. Fortunately, a few compadres of ours remained clothed and were able to convince the sheriff that we were just doing a tick check, that's all. Unconvinced, he asks us where we're from and then tells us he's not going to ticket us unless someone calls and complains.

Alas, at that point, we concluded that this Naked Mile had been thwarted for good, although some comment that they wouldn't really mind getting ticketed for biking in the nude in Kansas. As we bike on, we clear the top of a hill only to lay eyes on Interstate 70 which crossed right over our projected Naked Mile. So much for the remote back road! Sheriff 1, Team Awesome 0.

All this to make the point that HBC is not all grinding but is really a rich experience diversified by ridiculous shenanigans.

In other news, we had a kitten join our cavalcade for about an hour this afternoon. Evan biked up to the SAG wagon holding in one hand a poor abandoned kitten that he found on Rt. 24 near Bogue, Kansas. I called some of the local animal control centers who assured me that they just didn't have the facilities to handle a...cute abandoned kitten. So the kitten hung with us for about an hour (Melanie named her "Lucy"...that is, if it was a her, we weren't really sure). We eventually drove back to the place we found it and asked someone in the area if it was their cat; they took it in, and that was the last we saw of Lucy.

Well that should do it for now...thanks for another HUGE maildrop today! Signing off...

-Eric