Kansas Days

We left our boat in Guatemala to beat the heat and come here. All was fine until last week where a heat wave rolled across the states. With low humidity it was not so bad and even with the heat wave nights were in the low 70s. It’s over and last night it was in the 50s. We are still in Kansas and they call this the sun flower state for a reason. Sun flower grow wild every where out here. Pam loves sun flowers and because we are going back to our boat soon and don’t have time to plant and watch them grow she has been pulling up wild sun flowers and replanting them around the house.

If you look close you can see the grain silo in the back ground of the little town of Galatia, KS we live in.

With the heat wave she worked hard and they looked sad for some time but they are coming back now. She also planted a little garden with some plants the stores were selling out that was about dead because we got here late but were just a few pennies so we had little to lose. With her worrying with her garden, it’s coming around even knowing we won’t be here to harvest anything but her herb garden maybe will live on. Herb garden maybe a little strong with only having sage and her latest addition catnip.

Being out here we have a TV and it has changed in the last ten years. Every thing seems to be political now and we have had to deal with the Kansas DMV this week. Both a little disappointing. Trying to get a tag out here on our old motor bike. Need to have it inspected to make sure it’s not coming in to this state stolen. Motor numbers and stuff. Call and they say, “No appointment need.” but when we get there they say only on Mondays and Thursday after one o’clock. Going back today taking the 80 mile round trip again. Riding our old bike in the open Kansas country side again, isn’t so bad. Getting our driving licenses out here took 3 days and enough paper work to convince them we live our here now. We didn’t mention our boat or passports, long distant trips on our old motor bike. We diffidently didn’t tell them we still call our boat home. For our friends in Guatemala on their boats we will be home soon.

Another Day In Kansas

In our last blog I said a lot of boats are stored in the Caribbean and people go home to there home countries for the summer because of of it being so hot down there. We are still in Kansas and it’s hot out here this week. Temps over 100 but back in the 70s at night. It’s been great up till now with temps in the 60s at night. If there is one thing that identifies Kansas it’s the weather. With very few trees the wind is always a factor. When the weather is a factor in our life from Canada to Central America what number they place on the temperature is not enough to know how good or bad it will be. The first time in Canada and it was zero I thought it was not so bad. The next day it warmed to 10 above but the wind was blowing. My first lesson in how you can not just do the numbers. Today with the temp over 100 and the wind blowing over 30 MPH staying in the shade it wasn’t so bad but with us living the American dream we needed to take our son’s old ’72 Chevy truck to the trash dump. Just another past time in the US. The truck is old and we are old and all went well until we stopped on our way back at a grocery store and it was hot. Now the truck would not start. I was looking it over when a women we had met in the store offered to take us home over 20 miles away. Our son was working over 50 miles away. Remember out here every thing is far far away. We let her take us home to our little house out on the prairie. Now we had a chose, wait on our son to get home and then go back as I said far far away to work on the truck or go down in the basement and get a battery we have set up for our solar panels to power our some of lights, TV, radio and fans. A big battery. We have mentioned our old motor bike in our blogs before an old ’87 Honda 450. Now we were going back with a big battery strapped to the back of the bike with Pam and I motoring in to a 30 mile per hour wind and the temp over 100. The truck is now back in the drive way and the bike is back in the garage. The battery is back in the basement. The wind has stopped, it’s cool down and we had steak for supper. The adventure is still going and we hope maybe a lot of people out here didn’t take notice on two old people on and old bike with a big battery hanging on the back. Far as I know we don’t have a reputation out here. Reputations are a lot like numbers used for the temperature. There are other factors involved some times.

                                            Truck and Bike Safe at HOME

Rodeo Saturday Night

We are still in Kansas. A month now off our boat. People here say it’s hot here but its not not like it is in the Caribbean. At night here it’s in the low 60s after lunch mid 80s maybe 90s in the afternoon but always cool at night. Being off the boat is how most people in the boating world deal with the heat down there. They store their boats and go where it’s cooler. Going back to their boat in the winter. We are not so lucky. We are going back in a month. We need to work on our boat and get ready to come back out here for two months and do a little hunting in November and maybe spend Christmas here. This traveling from the Caribbean to Kansas and back ever few months is like living in two worlds. Growing up on American food, it’s great out here where you can buy fresh meat, flowers with out thing moving around in it and sleep cool at night. There are a lot to do out here after dark or in the late afternoon. This last week it was rodeo time.

Bronco Riding

Calf Roping

Happy Cowboy

A local rodeo with only 6 bull riders and the bulls won. The high light was kids riding sheep. When they have bad bulls at rodeos they always have bull fighters to distract the bulls when a rider is thrown off. They are good at what they do but wear stupid closes like a clown would wear.

Here if you look close you can see what I guess is a sheep fighter. Maybe 6 years old. Maybe they’re to distract a bad sheep, But is there any bad sheep? To make the rodeo night better we road our old motor bike and the ride back was let’s say different. This is farm country and this is a world of bugs. Not just a bug now and then but whole communities of bugs hitting the helmet and face shield. Straight roads where every thing looks alike looking through bugs remains trying to drive or ride is a new adventure. For now it’s steak, motor bike rides, cool nights and bugs.