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Hi. I’m back in the saddle after a couple years off. Just kid stuff, nothing dramatic.

Let’s ride… from Lawrence to St. Mary’s and back.
Sunday, May 30, 2010
7:00 AM to 7:00 PM
GPS Routes Posted in Later Post.
Start and end at the North Lawrence Burger King, 1100 North 3rd Street, Lawrence, KS 66044-9170 (785/ 842-4298)‎. This is 500 feet south of the I-70 East Lawrence Exit #204. Good parking at the Outlet Mall on the west side of the road. NOTE: This is NOT the 6th St. Burger King or the 23rd St. Burger King.

NOTE: I-70 Exit #204 “East Lawrence Exit” is CLOSED for construction. Use Exit #202 to access Lawrence from I-70.

Head north up the Buck Creek Road to Oscaloosa, west through Ozawkie, maybe Hoyt (the details are a little fuzzy), on our way to St. Mary’s. We will meet MacWildact in St. Mary's and he will show us the Oregon Trail area NW of St. Mary's and east of Tuttle Creek Lake, 100 miles. Then return to Lawrence either the fast way "SOUTH" GPS Route, or the scenic way, "NORTH" GPS Route.

My bike has 100 mile range. So we will get gas every 80 miles or so.

Everyone is welcome on this ride… but it’s not a ride for beginners. Lots of straight line riding, cruising gravel roads around 60 MPH plus. Very little pavement on this ride, less than 10 miles.

Post up if you are interested. Questions? Post! Or call Chris 785/766-9678.

I will be there with my trusty DR650.

David H

Sounds great, guys! I'll miss this one, but hope lots of riders get out to enjoy the gravel!

Count me in, will be riding over from North KC.

Todd

The Kansas Gravel Road Race Team is rolling again! Hey I got some Kansas football tickets for sale????

Sorry Chris I won't be able to make it this time. Be safe!

Daryl

I have the St. Marys/Oregon Trail route completed. About 100 miles. Lunch and food stop in Westmoreland.

Sweet - I will be there.

Bill Kimmell
816-728-6713

Could you post the route? Thanks.

Attached is the St. Marys/ Oregon Trail loop (sort of). Been a few years since I rode eastern Pott. county so I'm winging it until Westmoreland.

OK, this is all coming together just right. Larry’s going to show us around the area east of Tuttle Creek Lake and NW of St. Mary’s. This is going to be a long day, around 250 miles round trip from Lawrence, I’m guessing about 12 hours of riding. It will be a brisk pace, but not blistering. I have bald tires and two blown fork seals, I just figured out.

We’re going to leave Lawrence at 7:00 AM, not 8:00 AM as previously planned. And we will expect to return to Lawrence around 7:00 PM, but possibly as late as 8:00 PM. I’m going to edit the original post to prevent confusion over times.

I’m posting a Garmin GPS file with two routes to/from Lawrence and St. Mary’s, and the Oregon Trail Route as well. I have also reversed all the Routes, so there are a total of six routes in this file. The routes labeled NORTH have a little more curvy road and a bit more shady trees. The routes labeled SOUTH are faster, shorter, more straight roads, less shade. The plan is to follow the Route “Lawr to StMarys SOUTH” on the way out (departing Lawrence 7:00 AM and arriving St. Mary’s around 10:00 AM), then the Route “Oregon Trail” with MacWildcat in the lead (departing St Mary’s around 10:00 AM and returning to St. Mary’s around 3:00 or 4:00 PM, guessing) and returning to Lawrence around 7:00 PM, using the NORTH Route, not the SOUTH.

Please open these routes and export them to your GPS and play around with them a little. There is something funky about them. I think I made the NORTH routes on a Basemap of Garmin City Select North America V6, and the SOUTH Routes were made on a different (more recent?) basemap. Also, the NORTH routes act weird on my GPS 276C: I can’t figure out how to reverse the Route, it is very confusing, that’s why I have a second REVERSED version for all the Routes. Hard to explain, just play with it and figure it out, it will be cool.

David H. has to be back in Lawrence at 4:30 PM. So, wherever we are at about 2:00 PM, he will break off from the group. He would be happy to have some company. Also, Dave O. “The Electrician” will be joining us on his XR650L. It’s gonna be a great day. Post up and join us, and don’t be late: 7:00 AM Start.

Wish I could join in but as a suggestion, just north of Emmet on 63 is Aikin Switch Road (Cemetery on the right). This passes through the Byers and Rezac Ranches and though it is pavement it is a great example of the northern Flint Hills. Check out the stone bridge and return south on Onaga Road to 24. This area is particularly nice this time of year as the burn-off has regrown and the hills are some of the greenest stuff you've ever seen...best of luck and have a great ride!!!

It sounds like maybe my time estimates caused a bit of confusion. I just try to just give folks a rough idea of what the ride is going to be like. I’m not trying to schedule the whole thing out in detail. I try to be a little conservative. We’ve all done these rides enough to know that arrival times depend on what happens along the way.

Some folks think we can get from Lawrence to St. Mary’s in two hours, arriving by 9:00 AM. Maybe that’s possible. Let’s shoot for that. Everybody happy? Any concerns?

Who’s riding?

Had a good time Sunday. Unfortunate we got separated Chris and never caught up again. Broke the golden rule of never leaving a man behind.... Chris ended up riding a solo adventure for about 50 miles till the group met up again at St. Marys.

Lots of good roads up in that area. The Pott. county #2 lake is up in that area, would make a good spot to camp overnight.

Hope we can ride again together soon.

I think you mean Pott 1 lake. Pott 2's out my back door.

Great ride. Thanks, Larry. Tons of Minimum Maintanance Road on Larry's loop. It was rutted and sunbaked and dusty. Three Lawrence riders (Chris G., David H. and David O.) put about 230 miles on the clock, and two KC riders (Mike and Todd) probably had more than 300. It was overcast in the morning and warm in the afternoon. A lot of high speed gravel. Unfortunately, I have to re-learn the lesson every few years that all the east-west roads north of Topeka are paved (badly). Lunch in St. Mary's at a decent diner downtown. Yes, we did get separated, but we all followed the same GPS route, we regrouped in St. Mary's, and everything turned out OK.

There are some good looking roads, including a sweet water crossing, within about 5 to 10 miles east of St. Marys, on the GPS Route "St Mary's to Lawrence North".