July 25- Nickerson to Newton, Kan.

Today was a series of reminders that the Transamerica Bicycle Trail is a big deal to this part of the country.

Before leaving Hedrick's Animal Farm and B&B, we got a picture of the turkey with its ostrich friend. Truthfully, the turkey is more perceptive than we are to tell which ostrich is his buddy.

At the cafe in town where we had breakfast (Hedrick's breakfast was too late for our schedule), the owner had a cyclist logbook for us to sign and a map of the world where we put a pin on St. Pete Beach.

Riding conditions today were as near perfect as you can hope for. There is a large weather system moving across the country, with rain in northern Kansas and also in northern Oklahoma, with us in between; welcome cloud cover but no rain. There was no wind at all except for a slight headwind the last few miles, and the road surface was exceptionally smooth. The elevation even dropped slightly over the course of the day. So it was an easy 57 miles.

Newton, our destination town, has a population of 20,000 and is growing by 1000 per year. We stopped at the first Walgreens we've seen in a long while for a few needed items. Lunch was at Karen's Kitchen on Main Street. Karen keeps a cyclists log and also a wall full of pictures of touring cyclists who have stopped there. Pic below. Karen's husband is the sheriff, and I guess he's responsible for the many signs reminding motorists that the law requires them to give cyclists 3' of room, and also the only Transamerica Cycling Trail sign we've seen since we've started.

I finally found a barbershop open here, and left more hair on the floor than my head.

After lunch we found a good motel room and I sought out the first bike shop we've seen in probably 1000 miles. All I needed were chain lube and tube patches, but they were disappointed we were staying at a motel instead of sleeping at their shop. I'll let them tell their own story. Whether or not you are a cyclist or care about bike shops, don't miss this: www.vimeo.com/70983590

Their video was just made over the last two days, and last night at the animal farm we met the young man who is watching the thunderstorm at the end of the video. When James and his wife saw our bike they said "Oh, we know about you- you and your wife are on so-and-so's blog with a nice picture".

By the way, the storm they are showing on the video, from night before last, was the worst hailstorm in recent history, anywhere. At Hutchinson, 8 miles from Newton and 50 miles from where we were, they had hailstones the size of baseballs for 15 minutes and even some the size of grapefruits (pics were in the newspaper). No injuries, but all cars caught out in it were totalled, and a nursing home had all the windows on one side of the building knocked out. So yes, the kid in the video was glad he wasn't out there in a tent. We had not a drop of rain in Nickerson.

Back at the motel, Sandy and I walked across to a steakhouse where we had a nice drink and dinner at the bar. Our server Tammy was interested in our story, so we got her picture, too.