enRoute 2008 : Athens to the Pacific: Day 18: Patriots at the Pool

A night of responsible drinking at Philly's (in Fairview, KS) left us a little head-achy the morning of July, 4th. But that didn't stop mister Sam from arising bright and early to snap a few shots of the Luke-Nick sleepers before the intrusive sun slapped them awake by shining in their eyes (Pictured above). Our Hosts, Deb and Deb, had us in and Red haired Deb let us delve into her juice and fruit stock while we chatted about Indians and small town USA (Deb/Deb/SamLukeNic pictured below).

In the spirit of US patriotism, uncle Sam donned his red, white and blue foot coverings and we went on our way.

The first town we hit was Seneca, all was shut down for the 4th so we meandered over to the grocery store and gorged on pig ribs and bacterial cultures grown in cow milk. Heavy and too hot to really do anything we sat in front of the grocery for an hour or so staring at people. Eventually one man spoke to us and told us of a pool. We considered it for another 20 minutes, consented that swimming and sunburn was a good choice, and rode off.

The pool was your typical city pool. Lots of little kids with their moms, a few hot shots jack-kniving and double back-flipping off the high dive, a few cute 18 year olds watching the high-divers, us and a few others cooly keeping tabs on everything. Below are some pictures of us being cool at the pool...

Nick reared back, ready to impress,

Sam, mustache primed and eying the ladies,

Luke, the future of Nascar,

Sam and Luke reigning over their newly conquered aquatic gym.

The sunbathing and chlorine left us a bit tired but much cleaner than we had been and we took off for Marysville hoping for a great display of American operated Chinese pyro-wizardry. The route was hilly (not all Kansas is flat!) and pro-life advertisements dominated the billboards (pictured below). Upon entering Marysville we were lured once again into Sam Walton's empire and he fed us succulent juices (odwalla and boathouse) and cliff-bars before we found our way to the free RV hookup and tent camping grounds in the Marysville park.

Set up in the Marysville park was a success, and we had fireworks to light. But fireworks aren't fun if danger isn't involved, so we opted for a roman candle war. The war was quick, no casualties, all exploding projectiles detonated about us and not on us, and the cops didn't come. Hmm, maybe better luck next time. (Picture of Nick preparing to ignite his weapon).

Post war, the bugs came out. Nick escaped into the impermeable tent while Luke and Sam scurried off to the bar, where they found two free rounds awaiting them (Luke pictured below, intently eying something) before they came back, ravaged some sausage and fell asleep.