In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue, and he taught the world a thing or two. Why then do I find myself in the middle of Kansas thinking that maybe ol' Chris got it wrong? I've ridden more than 30 miles since lunch and haven't turned or leaned the Heritage Softail® Classic once. Is the world, after all, flat?

The cool, dry May, desert air carries a slight nip as it pours over the Victory Cross Country's short windshield and proves an excellent adjunct to the pick-me-up qualities of our breakfast caffeine. The early morning traffic is light, the road lonely, and in the distance, the fabled snowcapped peaks of the Rocky Mountains dominate the landscape.

For years, I had wanted a motorcycle and for one reason or another had never attained one. But after I returned from an all expenses paid trip to the other side of the world, courtesy of Uncle Sam, the motorcycle fund was sizable enough and my wanderlust was brewing.

Quite a few people who haven't been to Kansas have formed their impressions of the state by watching a movie made in 1939. The Wizard of Oz, filmed in a Hollywood studio, portrays Kansas as hot, dry, tornado-ridden and tabletop flat. While this may be a somewhat apt description of western Kansas, the state's eastern region has a surprisingly hilly topography. And our five-day tour through this enchanting prairie landscape turns out to be anything but dry.

For motorcyclists, tours on mountain roads have their obvious joys: there's beauty in the scenery and passion in the pavement. When you're riding the serpentines of twisty highways and climbing through passes, every moment on a bike is unavoidably invigorating. But having toured so many mountain roads, I came to wonder what a journey would be like in the parts of America that bikers tend to ignore. A place, for instance, like Kansas.