Kansas is Wide!

Today we spent the whole day in Kansas except for the last ten miles heading to our motel in Burlington, Colorado. We decided early on to see a few sights along the way, and we certainly did.

Our first stop was the Flint Hills Tall Grass Prairie, an overlook a few miles off I-70. The vista across the valley was beautiful.

Our next stop was Abilene, the childhood home of Dwight Eisenhower. We watched the movie first, along with a large number of youngish to middle-aged people, almost all men. I talked to one of them and he said they were military people from 89 countries going through a leadership training program at Fort Leavenworth. The two I spoke with were from the Philippines and Cambodia. Very interesting! After the movie about Ike's life, we had a guided tour of the home. The entire campus was beautifully kept, with four main buildings -- the home, visitor center, museum, and library. There was also a small chapel where Ike and Mamie are buried. The home was small and typical for the late 19th century. His parents raised six sons there. 

After touring the house, we took advantage of a picnic area to have our lunch (no photo; it was the same as yesterday). We did a quick tour of the museum. We were fortunate; the museum had been closed for renovations and today was the first day it was reopened. We didn't tour the library.

And then we hit the road again. The thermometer on the car kept climbing and settled at 100° for most of the afternoon. We were very grateful for air-conditioning! 

Our next stop was further off the highway in the town of Lucas. We had read about an eccentric man who built a house of limestone and surrounded it with sculptures he made out of cement. It was very weird and worth seeing. The house looked like a log cabin as you can see below, but the "logs" were actually limestone. They were similar to the fence posts we saw lining the roads in that area. He called his place the Garden of Eden and many of the sculptures were Biblical. The main entrance showed Adam and Eve. 

The grounds had numerous structures and more odd sculptures all over. The oddest thing was the mausoleum, which the young woman working unlocked for us and a couple who were also visiting. Our hero's coffin had a glass top and his decomposed/mummified body was visible. Pictures not allowed, thank goodness! His wife was buried below him, in cement, of course.

Our last stop was going to be Castle Rock, a supposedly wonderful outcropping in the middle of flat land. However, when we discovered it was 15 miles south of the highway and mostly dirt road, we decided we'd had enough sight-seeing for one day. We got to our motel about 5:30, unpacked, and went to dinner. It was a good decision, as there were only a few people there when we arrived and a crowd waiting when we left. The Dish Room had excellent food; we both had dinner salads.

We've gained an hour each day so far, but we'll be in Colorado for a while now. We are coming along well with Around the World in 80 Days; we only have about an hour to go -- the group has arrived in Liverpool and Fogg has been arrested. (You must know the story...)