I was cruising along pretty good, enjoying the cool night breeze in my face, and wondering why that, in such air, the engine temp was hanging right at 210. It didn't seem to matter if I was driving through a small town at 35 mph, or cruising down a skinny two lane at 3200 RPM, still the same. The route took us through Welch Oklahoma, which was home for my Wife from the time she was three, until she was fourteen. I fired off a text to let her know, along with the obligatory, "Wish you were here". I really meant it this time though, as this was my first Drag Week leg, that I was solo in the car, and I was missing having someone to share the drive with. I drove into Oswego Kansas at around two in the morning, and located checkpoint #3. It was a corner park, with a rail car parked in it, but the driveway into the park was gravel, and ran literally beside a residence. I decided to pull off on the shoulder of the road to take my picture, rather than have the exhaust from my side pipes reverberating off the side of some one's house! I stepped out in the middle of the street to take my picture just as the local sheriff came around the corner in his police issue SUV. He stopped in the road beside me, checked out the Valiant, and said, "You must be one of the stragglers, everyone else came through yesterday".
"Yeah, I'm running a little late." I agreed.
He wished me luck, and drove on, so I decided to call Boone again and check on their progress.
"We are at the station, filling up all the jugs with E-85, then we will meet Darren at the first checkpoint. He went by his house to finish packing his clothes, and take another shower."
"So, you got the trailer all packed up and ready to roll?"
"Yeah, everything but the kitchen sink. It's going OK with you?"
"So far, but still 153 miles to go!"