September 19, 2010 - Hutchinson to El Dorado Lake, Kansas - A GREAT DAY!

Today may have been the best day of our trip so far, thanks to our new friends Glenn and Sondra Barrier.  Dana, Andreas and I left Hutchinson first, and Lisa left somewhat later.  Our route was somewhat confusing as we were not following the Adventure Cycling map and were "off route".  We knew we had to go through Newton, Kansas and that we wanted to end up in El Dorado, Kansas, preferrably in one of the state parks on El Dorado Lake.  Dana, Andreas and I probably spend about an hour in Newton riding around and also getting a bite to eat (pie!).  We then made a hasty decision about which route we would take to El Dorado.  Our decision was fine, but we then decided to take a "short-cut" to a particular road.  The "short-cut" ended up taking us to the alternate route (not where we thought we would be) and within a minute of us getting to the unintended route we saw Lisa.  We headed on into El Dorado (total distance of about 73 miles) where Dana called her mother to find out where we needed to go.  Somehow, Fran was confused (we had not given her very good directions!) and was 40 miles south of El Dorado on an entirely different lake!  It was 90 degrees by now and there was no way we could ride another 40 miles, so we told her to turn around and meet us at the Burger King/Walmart in El Dorado.  We decided to wait for Fran in the Burger King and started talking with a local couple.  They were interested in our ride and suggested the campground where we should stay which was right on Lake El Dorado, and had full hook-ups.  They also got on the phone with Fran and gave her good directions for finding the Burger King.

We followed Sondra and Glenn's advice, and found a perfect camping spot on the lake.  Lake El Dorado is a very large lake and is really beautiful.  We showered and started talking about dinner when we looked over on the lake and saw Glenn and Sondra in their boat close to shore where we were camping.  These dear people had gone out of their way to find us and then invited us for a boat ride.  Of course we accepted, and we had a wonderful evening with them.  The weather was perfect as was the company. 

One of the things I have noticed about Kansas is that it has some of the nicest, most helpful, and friendliest people you will meet anywhere.  Glenn and Sondra are a wonderful example of this.

Sunset on Lake El Dorado