Where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain (Ponca City, OK)

Oklahoma has quickly earned its way to the top of my favorite states list. The kindess we've received from strangers here, the beautiful countryside, cooler temperatures, and gentle sloping hills have been downright rejuvenating. We left the Church of Christ in Bartlesville a little regretfully, after an extra hour of sleep, delicious breakfast and leftover snacks packed into our Camelbaks and jersey pockets. The ride today was really scenic, as we took a lot of back roads out of town. Someone from Bartlesville's local bike shop kindly planned the route out for us and took Lindsay on a ride yesterday to mark all the turns with washable spray paint, saving us a lot of headache. We were lucky again in that we avoided rain for most of the day, and were only caught by two or three showers. The heavy rains Oklahoma has received recently have meant cooler temperatures for us (low 80's instead of 100+) and a much greener landscape than is usual for this time of year. Unfortunately, they have also meant devastating flooding for many local farmers.

We arrived by midafternoon at our host site in Ponca City, First Lutheran Church and School. Our hosts here have been amazingly generous as well, welcoming us with a marquee and volunteers, and posting signs to direct us around the church. We're sleeping tonight in their beautiful sanctuary, which won't be the first time I've fallen asleep in a church pew. They also prepared us an awesome lasagna dinner (we're getting the recipe for that vegetarian lasagna), and we had the opportunity to give another presentation about our trip (great job Ryan and Risa!).

PS - Check out yesterday's journal below.

Bike odometer: 1671 miles










Group with the awesome volunteers at Adams Blvd Church of Christ











We saw a lot of the results of torrential rains on Oklahoma as we rode today. One volunteer at First Lutheran told us that Ponca City has had 36" (a yard!) of rain since January, more than their yearly average. Flooding has destroyed crops and led to several deaths in southern Oklahoma.










We also rode by a lot of ranches, which looked kind of like I imagined from picture books: big iron gates with the name of the ranch over the top, men on horseback, cattle, goats.










Lee Anne and Jen on the road, storms in the background. It's cool being in such wide-open country because you can see where rain is falling from miles away.













Our welcome to First Lutheran













Risa looks very scholarly reading a book in the church narthex