Today was spent crossing 77 miles of impressive emptiness. There were fortunately two places that broke the bleakness of the journey. We set out from Jordan at about 9.30am having packed up in the Kariotis Park and then visited the grocery store to get some food for lunch. The wind was against us all day but never very strongly. So we did about 40 miles to Sand Springs where we found Tracey and Jack running the grocery store and filling station, with a large dog called bowie. She made us milkshakes, refilled two water bottles and directed us to the cyclists'' journal which detailed 20 years of visits by transam cyclists. We recognised some names - people that we have met since starting. The register includes people that stayed at Sand Springs as well as those who found it a useful temporary pause to fill their water bottles and drink milk shakes as we did. It is a place that contains a goodly number of hens and places to camp - but we need to use the afternoon for cycling. But Tracey is closing down in order to go and start a new venture - a motel near the Roosevelt National Park. Tracey said there is storm warning, which seemed unlikely to us since the sky looked blue with just a touch of fluffy clouds. We set off again and indeed after ten miles there was a growing haze of dark clouds on the horizon straight ahead. Could we make it to the shelter of the rest area before the storm? Seemed unlikely since we had ten more miles to go but those ten miles were mostly downhill into a large valley. Well we sort of made it - the lightning (mostly horizontal forks between clouds) and thunder started in earnest with about three miles to go and within sight of the rest area's solid building there was a tremendous downpour and the wind went up to a gale of a headwind. We got into the shelter a bit wet but glad to be out of the storm. When the storm abated we ate our very late lunch in one of the outdoor shelters watching the blackness travel away to the east. The temperatures recovered and we set off - 20 miles to Winnett was covered without further rain until we got within sight of the town when the next storm arrived. It was really just rain and fairly moderate. The campsite has closed down, no response to our phone call or signs. We tried the motel - it appeared to be functioning but had a no vacancies and no one appeared when we rang the bell. A man walking past said it was not open for business. So the only resort we had was to pitch our tent in the park in the rain - though it had more or less stopped by then. We should have been able to use the showers and toilets in the swimming pool - open until 8pm (we arrived at about 7pm) but, unsurprisingly for Winnett, it was closed. Perhaps it always closes when it rains.... Once again we can see blue clear warmed water... through a fence. The shop closed at 6pm so we ate a pizza at the Winnett bar - still open! Then we retired to our tent to sleep. To top it all, the park claims to have a sprinkler system that starts at 8am, so we will need to remove our tent by then. I didn't believe Winnett could organise an efficient sprinkler system and was for ignoring it - the grass looks mostly parched. I was partly right - a few nozzles are firing water in various areas but our tent would have only been very lightly sprinkled - and a towel or a plastic tub would have dealt with that sprinkler. The result of all this sprinkling is a piebald effect - green with baked areas. We're waiting for the bar to open and feed us our breakfast. We are here.