Day 10: Turning 25 on the road from Denver, CO to Norman, OK

Mileage: 682
Total Mileage: 4593The most dreaded day of driving was upon me, and it was my birthday. It just worked out that way since I had to be in Norman on the afternoon of April 30th. I was sad to leave Colorado, since I was getting comfortable there. It seemed like the reason I was doing this drive was over after I left Denver that morning.
The dreaded part was the flatness. I'll be seeing a lot of this this summer, but that is just where the storms are, so that was a choice I made going into this. In a way, it was neat because it was all different from anything I've experienced, and it looked as the Great Plains should look.
It was EXTREMELY windy this day, winds 40 mph gusting to 50 mph in spots, so I had to take the drive slow in fear of sliding off of the road. I also had to stop and take my bike off of the top of the car and shove it inside since it was creating an unmanageable sail. It took me 13 hours with minimal stops to get from Denver to Norman. On the bright side, I received a lot of phone calls to make the time go quickly. Thanks to everyone who contributed to that - it REALLY helped out!
I was shocked to find that Oklahoma is actually not all that flat - it has some hills! I expected pancake flat but it is not so bad and definitely hills on all of the roads - hillier than the Colorado roads! Talk about backwards of my imagination. Finally got into Norman at 12:30am that night. A long day it was, but I made it - no speeding tickets, no loss of items or limbs, and on top of that, I didn't pay for lodging one night the ENTIRE 10 days. How's that for an accomplishment?!