Looking for the Ruby Slippers

Along the road, we saw a very impressive road building crew at work. They had strung together a number of trucks and various bits of machinery into a train which must have been 400 or so metres long and took up half the road. What it was doing was melting, milling, grading, resurfacing and rolling half the road at a time - all in a series of linked operations. Very slick indeed! We spent the night in Winfield and as we were checking in, a truck pulled up and the driver greeted us. In the truck was Jerry Crowe and his dad. Jerry is assistant Director of the Kansas Chapter of the Gold Wing Road Riders Association (we are also members) and wanted to know who it was that had ridden into his town! It was nice of Jerry to greet us and we exchanged some pleasant conversation. Ric even talked to his lovely wife Cheryll Crowe (like the singer only not spelled the same) on the phone. We left Winfield early as thunderstorms were again predicted. We dodged the thunderstorms but did hit some rain but worse, we were hit with high cross winds. After 250 miles we had had enough and about lunchtime reached Meade where we checked out the hide-out of the Dalton Gang. Two of the Dalton brothers were killed and one seriously injured when they tried robbing a couple of banks in nearby Coffeyville. On the way to Meade, we saw something very unusual. Lots of big black spiders, easily half the size of your hand or bigger were crossing the road! As they were all moving in the same direction, Jenny reckoned they were involved in some kind of migration. Ric reckoned they were on the way to the milking shed.

We arrived in Dodge City having ridden about 300 miles and glad to be out of the wind. The prairies, including Montana, the Dakotas, Kansas, Oklahoma etc are not motorcycle friendly at this time of the year. No offense to the people or the places but the winds (which always seem to be coming from one side or the other) are just awful - especially when gusts and the turbulence from semis are thrown in. At Dodge, we visited Boot Hill and the recreated main street. We were again re-united with our old friend Wyatt Earp who, you will recall, we first met in Deadwood, South Dakota. Wyatt was an assistant City Marshall in Dodge City and with Bat Masterson and a few others, was credited with cleaning up what really was a pretty lawless and dangerous town. Doc Holiday set up his dentist rooms in the hotel in Dodge and of course, both went on to Tombstone, Arizona where Wyatt was deputy Sheriff. It seems ironic that Wyatt Earp, the most famous lawman in history was never more than a deputy Sheriff or assistant city Marshall. After just an overnight stay, we had to get out of Dodge. We left Kansas and crossed into Oklahoma - no tin man, no wizard, no Toto and no ruby slippers.