Waking up at 5am is hard to do, and you know what? it’s even harder to do after a few cold ones the night before. All headaches aside, I reluctantly pulled myself from that sleeping bag I called home for five hours and began to get ready. We had around a thousand miles to cover, mostly Kansas. Yes! hot, sticky, flat Kansas. Curse you Kansas, Curse you, but I digress.

The thousand or so miles we had to cover wasn’t that bad thanks to a few well placed stops along the way including The Kansas Capitol building in Topeka, Truman and Eisenhower’s childhood homes, and some rock climbing at Rock City! Yes, you read that right, rock climbing in Kansas.

Bill climbing at Rock City, KS

Missouri seemed to cruise by, but maybe because I slept through most of it though. Kansas on the other hand was grueling. I think I could deal with all the flat and lack of things to look at, if it hadn’t been so hot. The temperature floated arounf 104 degrees Fahrenheit for much of the day. My poor air conditioner just couldn’t keep up with the heat so it rarely got to a comfortable temp.

Patrick climbing the Colorado sign.

Probably one of the most liberating feelings of the day was when we crossed the Colorado line right around sunset. We celebrated by donning our climbing shoes and chalk bags for some climbing on the rocky welcome to Colorado sign. Crazy you ask? absolutely. We did just spend around eight hours driving through hot as hell Kansas.(Kansas wasn’t that terrible, just hot!!!!)

Two and a half  hours after our triuphant ascent of Colorado’s welcome sign we arrived in Longmont Colorado where we were welcomed(thats a lot of w’s) by our friend Liz. We shared the story of our day with her then promptly went to bed. Eldorado Canyon awaited us after a short sleep.