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The plan is to ride almost all dirt/ gravel around the state of Kansas. Starting in Lawrence at my house on Sept 2 (Friday). We will head north to Whitecloud, then west to Colorado. South to Okla., east to Missouri, and back to lawrence. I have a route planned, but you have to go with the flow due to rain,roads closed, etc. the route will be on or as close to the Kansas border as possible. There will be lots of different geological changes. Camping and CHEAP motels for night. I need electricty to sleep for health issues so camping would need to have that for me to camp. Trip is approx. 1400 miles, but wouldn't be supprised if it turned into 1600. 6/7 days would be my guess. Cell phone coverage will be spotty at best, and probably non existant for a major portion of the ride.

So far I have one maybe, and will need at least one companion rider for me to feel safe due to the remoteness. You are welcome to join for all or parts of the ride.

David Hemphill

Just got home from riding with David on the first section of his trip. I rode to Lawrence Thursday afternoon (108 degrees when I left Manhattan!). Felt like a KTM kabob on the asphalt, way beyond just toasty.
We headed out from Lawrence Friday morning, working our way along the east side of Kansas up to White Cloud. David got his first flat out of the way 30 miles north of Lawrence. The flooding beyond Atchsion was pretty startling, we had to scrape our original route and take high ground to White Cloud.

From White Cloud we stayed right on the state line as much as possible, deviating a mile north or south whenever roads didn't exist on the border. Fuel is a issue for the gas guzzler KTM. Luckily at Sommerfield we were setting at the keytrol when a local showed up to gas up his vehicle.
We kept working our way west and ultimately ended up at Larry O's house at Concordia for the night. Friday's route mileage - 284 miles. Larry and David headed on west this morning, hopefully making it to St. Francis by nightfall.

I hot footed it back to Manhattan this morning so I don't miss the best college football team in Kansas - Go Wildcats!

I can now confidently say a KTM 400 exc is no distance machine. Wow, total of 475 miles since Thursday afternoon. Maybe a 530 in my future?

Just hoping David and riding buddies have a safe trip, there isn't much of anything in support services near the border. Lots of good low maintenance sections.