Thursday, July 31, 2014 We are a little “off” today with the change in time zones. We are now in the Central Time Zone and left the campground at 9:00. It was a beautiful, sunny day. Kansas is very flat with acres and acres of farm fields. There were also many oil rigs. Some were actually drilling for oil.
With all the open spaces here, this is a good place for those wind generators.
The blade we saw yesterday on the semi truck, was on its way where they are building more wind generators not far from Douglas. In the center of the state, they were everywhere. We saw a billboard for the Wizard of Oz Museum which got us to thinking where Dorothy lived in Kansas. We looked it up and her aunt’s home was considered to be in Wamego or Liberal, KS. They are both not far here. (FYI) We entered a part of Kansas called the Smoky Hills Region –an area of rolling hills, mesas, buttes, and rock outcroppings.
This area features sandstone caps such as this rock toadstool.
Because wood was scarce, the pioneers carved fenceposts out of limestone like these. They are still being used today. We saw them around fields along the way.
The scenery was monotonous so Bob and I decided to amuse ourselves. We decided to take a survey of which type of RVs we see the most of on the road. We did it for about 80 miles on the way to Wichita. The results are in. We saw 13 travel trailers, 6 fifth wheels, and 5 buses. I think we’ll try it again tomorrow on a more well-traveled highway. We’ll see how the results compare with today’s.
We arrived in Wichita around 2:00 and saw the biggest grain elevator we’ve ever seen.
There were no less than 8 large grain elevators in the immediate area of downtown. I guess Kansas is a large grain-producing state. Down the center of the Interstate through the center of town was a huge drainage ditch filled with water. We’ve never seen anything like that before either.
We arrived in our campground, Air Capital RV Park, on the south end of Wichita at 2:10.
Bob checked us in and asked why the park is called Air Capital. They told him it is because all airplane manufacturers have either been here or are here now. Interesting! We have found in both of the Kansas RV parks that we’ve stayed in, that they provide storm shelters and notify you where the storm shelters are in case of weather emergencies. Bob had to remind me of where we are and that Dorothy of Oz didn’t start in Kansas for nothing. Ha! We were escorted to our site, settled in, and checked things out in the campground.
It was warm when we arrived so we put on the AC and relaxed a little before dinner. We had grouper on the grill and took Auggie for his walk once it cooled off a bit. We are on the road again tomorrow where the road will take us into Oklahoma.
