DAY 63 

Got up at 3:30am (Sunday) and asked God what I should do; stay another day, or travel since the wind had shifted from north to south, and as I understand it, God said travel because it was so cold no one would be out and about anyway, and the wind was in my favor. So I went to work at 4am and there was LOTS to do. The temperature was around 16 degrees, and because the wind had shifted, I was in the wind while doing chores and making breakfast…I think the wind-chill was about 8 degrees. As always for breakfast, I cooked a big bowl of cream of wheat with honey and walnuts, and grapefruit and green pepper slices on the side. My grapefruit and green pepper slices froze almost immediately after getting them out of the cooler, and I had to lay them on a plate and warm them over my propane stove! The food in my cooler was warmer than outside! I did a slew of chores including mucking out the barn, mucking the fairgrounds yard, taking down my windbreaks, drying my tent fly in the sale-barn restroom, cleaning the wagon and Reba’s harness which were both covered in a very heavy layer of dust (quick clean), and may other smaller chores so that, by working steady, I was ready to go at 12 noon - it took 8 hours of working in tough conditions simply to be ready to go! I stopped at the grocery store and resupplied before heading north out of Yates Center on gravel roads. There was no time for lunch, so I ate chips and bean dip while Reba pulled the wagon with intent. I took a wrong turn and got lost, but a kind man in a pickup truck gave me directions that kept me going towards the town of LeRoy without having to backtrack. He also told me I could camp at his parent’s house in the tiny town of Vernon along the way and, although it was too many miles for me to make on that day, I greatly appreciated his offer. Thank you kind Sir! Next a kind couple stopped and I told them what I was about and I was looking for a place to camp and they pointed me to the next place up the road and said that the fellow there could help me. And I would like to say that there have been many folks who stopped and said kind words out on the gravel all along the journey, and they don don’t all get mentioned, but I would like to point out that which some people might not believe; there hasn’t been one negative person, not one, and that is a wonderful statement about rural America, and I didn’t say it, God did!

Photo taken while traveling towards the town of LeRoy from Yates Center. Neat looking pair of horses.

Text Post: DAY 63: I WOULD LIKE TO GIVE A SHOUT OUT TO ERIC who let me camp in his hay barn. When I asked Eric if he could call the fellow who owned the land across the way and ask him if I could camp in the windbreak of some cedar trees, Eric pointed to his hay barn and said that I was welcome to camp in his hay barn. Thank you Eric!

Text Post: DAY 63: By the time I got all set up in Eric’s hay barn and was ready for bed, it was 8:30pm. I didn’t go to sleep but worked on the computer for 2 hours on Faith March work that needed to be done, so I hit the sack at 10:30pm. It was a 19 hour workday in tough conditions. I didn’t want to set my alarm, but the south wind was going to blow again for at least one more day, and cold though it be, it would be at our backs and that was good, so I set my alarm for 4am. I got up in the middle of night to feed and water Reba, then back to sleep.