BOOT HILL (Dodge City, KA) Starting Time: 9:32 A.M. Ending Time: 12:55 P.M. Total Distance: 51 miles Time on the Saddle: 3 hours 23 minutes We woke up this morning to the sweet aroma’s of garden city, Kansas. The continental breakfast was neither filling nor fun. But the highlight of breakfast was the hard core cowboy who was a die-hard SC fan. We hesitantly mounted our bikes and quickly found our noses were blessed with the wonderful fragrances derived from the countless cattle stockyards, which surrounded the large farming town. We began riding vigorously at 9:30 A.M. to escape the foul smells but to no avail. There were even more stockyards and cattle grounds to punish us as we rode. We embraced the few respites, which the road permitted us to have, and enjoyed the vast farm lands and prairie grounds which dominate the landscape of western Kansas. We rode hard, encouraged by the afternoon of activities planned for us in Dodge City, Kansas. We arrived in Dodge City at about 1:00 P.M. Danny checked us into the Comfort Inn, and through his continuous revelations about the bike trip managed to persuade the assistant manager, Kelly Lazelle, to donate a room for our cause. The room was donated for one of two reasons: either because of the goodwill of the manager or to shut Danny up - as you may or may not know Danny can talk the ears off a jackrabbit. Either way we appreciate the kind gesture by Comfort Inn. After a well deserved and short nap we ventured downtown to Boot Hill. Boot Hill, for y’all history deficient folks out there, is the hill where the original residents of Dodge City would bury there dead. This who’s that of cemeteries received its name because the boots of the deceased would stick out of the shallow graves. This disrespect for the dead was necessary due to the constant gunfights, which sent countless numbers to their graves. The cemetery holds the remains of such famous characters from the Wild West as Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson. After viewing Boot Hill we explored the museum of Dodge City and learned numerous facts about life in Kansas during the late 1800’s. Floyd, Lydia, Charles, and Danny enjoyed this very much. Sean was bored out of his mind and was hoping that a lightning bolt would strike him dead. Fortunately this did not happen. Roman would have enjoyed this museum, but he quickly got turned off by the politically correct viewpoints held by the museum about Indians. I mean Native Americans and the white man - I mean the evil white man. So after a few minutes Roman was in the same boat as Sean. We finally abandoned the museum around 5:00 and headed off to dinner at Casey’s Cowtown Club. We ordered one round of calf fries and bravely devoured this odd appetizer. Everyone enjoyed the calf fries except Lydia, who would not try one. A delicious dinner followed the fries. We then returned to our hotel rooms. A relaxing swim was had by all. The NBA games were exciting tonight. Then we got some much needed shut-eye. Tomorrow we hope to make it near Pratt, KA.