Kansas today, Colorado tomorrow

ST. FRANCIS, Kans. – I’m settled in comfortably in my rooms – yes that was rooms, plural – at the charming old Cook’s Empire Motel in St. Francis, Kans. after a generally pleasant 387-mile ride across the Sunflower State on U.S. 36.

Garmin says I spent 6 hours 32 minutes in motion with an average moving speed of 58.2 mph. I spent an hour and 21 minutes stopped for gas and food and my maximum speed was 114 mph (passing two big grain trucks on a wide open straightaway somewhere in eastern Kansas).

I found the Empire Motel with an Internet search last  night and phoned in my reservation from the road. It’s one of those old mom and pop places run by a young couple (no curry powder aroma in the office because they’re definitely multi-generational Americans). I was stunned to discover I actually have a suite of rooms and can choose which of the two bedrooms to occupy tonight. I’m picking the front room so I can be closer to the door and my bike, although this place feels relatively secure.

What makes this place even better is the free Wifi and the fact that my Sprint cell phone has a booming 5 bars of signal strength. It’s costing me a very modest $37 and change.

And, Alma, Colo., is within easy striking distance (274 miles)tomorrow. I gain an hour when I cross into the Mountain Time Zone 15 miles west of here.

Before leaving St. Joseph, I stopped to pose my bike at the old Pony Express stables where the short-lived (April 1860 to October 1861) mail service began. It seemed appropriate, since the Pony Express route followed present-day U.S. 36 from St. Joseph to Marysville, Kans.

Then I rode a few blocks east to pose it in front of the house where Bob Ford blew a hole in Jesse James’s head on April 4, 1882. I visited the house and toured the grounds a few years ago when I was researching a piece on the Jesse James tourism draw of western Missouri for RoadBike magazine. The house originally stood a couple  of blocks north on Lafayette Street, but was moved to the Belt Highway in 1939 and then again to its present location in 1977 as part of the Pattee House Museum complex.

I stopped for lunch at the Belleville Dairy Queen where I got a cheeseburger and cup of water for an amazing $1.61.

I paused again a short distance east of Smith Center to pose the bike in front of an historical marker informing passers-by that they are three miles south and a mile east of the actual geographic center of the 48 contiguous states. So I guess this is a picture of my bike slightly off-center.

I jammed on the brakes about 15 miles west of Smith Center to photograph the city limits sign of the unfortunately named Athol of  Kansas. That makes Goobertown and Buck Snort, Ark., seem absolutely refined.

And on the mechanical front, I was delighted to find that I can actually see the oil level in my newly replaced sight glass. The original sight glass had become so murky as to be unusable, so I had it replaced when the bike was serviced a couple of weeks ago at Grass Roots BMW Motorcycles in Cape Girardeau, Mo.