Miles: 1,133
We completed our third official Iron Butt and they really seem to be easier every year. We left at 3:00 on the nose and exactly 3 hours later we stopped at Oakwood IL to gas up and have a quick bite of breakfast. Less than an hour later on the other side of Decatur we stopped to put on the rain suits. The rain was not bad but it never is nice when the rain suits come out so early in the trip, but at least it wasn't while we were riding in the dark. We stopped in Hannibal MO to gas up remove the rain suits and it was 8:30 local. We didn't waste much time here after downing a couple of Gatorades we were on our way. Another couple of hours in the saddle and we stopped at Pershing State Park. This is a nice little state park very near to John Pershing's home in Laclede MO. He supposedly payed in these woods in the state park. There is an old bridge over Locust Creek that was our stopping point and we had a little lunch we had packed. We had broken away from the interstate but we were still riding on four-lane roads until we crossed over the mighty MO in St. Joseph. Once in KS we stopped in Wathena for gas where the two-lane began, and would stay on two-lane the rest of the day. It was now 12:20 local, and we were slightly more than halfway. Just east of Beatrice NE we were cruising in the two-lane and it had become very windy. There was essentially no traffic on the road, but as we came upon a slow moving pickup truck I could see an oncoming car so I sped up some and as I was coming back into the right lane I hit a huge bird of some sort. I don't know exactly what it was but it really could have shattered my windshield. I think the only reason it didn't was the low angle of the windshield and it just glanced off of it. However, now I was looking into a mess of blood and guts on my windshield. I was very well protected from the watery mess and Steve got more of it than I did. As we rolled into town I spotted a car wash and we made a brief but very necessary stop to wash the birds guts off. On the other side of Beatrice we made a scheduled stop at the Homestead National Monument. There are several spots in less than a couple of miles all related to one another. The one furthest east seems to be the newest and biggest, but we continued to the next one that is smaller but had some shaded picnic areas where we stopped for lunch. Needless to say we didn't go into the museum but it really looked first rate. Our next stop was Lawrence NE for some gas and air in Steve's tire. Our last stop was at Massacre Canyon in NE near the Republican River. It was a battle fought in 1873 between the Pawnee and the Sioux and marked the end of the fighting on the plains for the most part. The roadside park was nice and we had the place to ourselves. It closing in on 7:00 so we mounted up for the last push into CO. We came in on US 34 and stopped in Brush to give the bikes a quick wash and pick up a couple of beers. We stopped to gas up by the hotel to save us time in the morning and hit the hotel parking lot at 9:22 local time. We did some work some work in the hotel lobby while drinking some beers. Wait, I did some work, Steve retired in November so I'm not sure what he was doing. We unwound called it a night after a record setting day.