July 30 - Traveling on to Cedar Bluff State Park, Ellis, Kansas

  We left Kanopolis State Park fairly early this morning, and our current location is only 2 hours away, so we stopped and did a little grocery shopping and had lunch out.  We are about half way across Kansas.  The terrain is now a lot flatter, but still is very pretty.  There are lots of rolling "high plains", with cattle grazing.  But there is also farm fields of soy, corn, sorghum, and wheat.  The dark greens of the soy and sorghum and the golden of the grains, all swaying in the breeze it really beautiful.  Then, there are the occasional wind turbine farms, of hundreds of wind turbines.  All producing electricity from wind.  Neat!
  We arrived at the park and set up.  It is 94 degrees and breezy, but the sun is so hot, it is hard to be outside.  It has taken our RV all day to cool off down to 83 degrees, with the sun beating down on it.  There are only small trees around our campsite, so the shade is minimal.
  After setting up, I drove around the park, to get a sense of it, while Peter stayed in the air conditioning.  The heat really knocks us out.  I stopped at the beach, and just sat in the water for a bit to cool off.  The waves were really nice--not too big, not too small.  Came back, showered in cool water, warmed up leftover dinner, reserved a few Thousand Trails campsites for 3 months from now, and did the blog.  Will watch an episode of something or other, and just read.
  Tomorrow is supposed to be 102 degrees.  We think it will be a day in town.

Cedar Bluff State Park photos:

Beach 

July 29 - Kanopolis State Park, Marquette, KS

  We drove over to the northern shore of the Kanopolis Lake, where the other campgrounds are located.  Walked a "wildlife viewing" loop around a "prairie pothole" pond.  A lot of the campgrounds near the lake were closed due to high water damage earlier in the year.
  Then we drove over to Mushroom Rock State Park.  There were really neat rock formations out in the middle of nowhere.  The 5 acres they are on were donated to the State and made into a little park.
Came back to the RV.  Other than the camp host, we are the only other campers in our loop.  Nice and quiet.  I drove over to the "Caving Banks" campground, which is a meadow overlooking the lake, whose soft banks are all caving in.  I found a wonderful shady area under a tree, set up my camp chair, and enjoyed the view and the breeze.  I listened to two interesting technology Ted Talks, and just read for a while.
   When I returned, I tried to go online and get the instructions for how to make the Squash Origami books that Jeanne Boetig teaches how to make.  But I had difficulty.  Then I found and input the next campground address into the RV, along with a grocery store on route.  We are really low on food.
Went into the nearby town of Lindsborg.  Interesting predominately Swedish town.  Home of the Anatoly Karpov's (World Chess Champion) first US Chess School.  Why in Lindsborg, Kansas, of all places, we weren't able to find out.  Had dinner at a good local Bar & Grill.

Kanopolis State Park wildlife viewing loop photos:

Mushroom Rock State Park photos:

Afternoon at Caving banks overlook photos:

Lindsborg photo:

July 28 - Kanopolis State Park, Marquette, KS

  We took a long hike around this campground-about 3.5 miles, early this morning, before the heat of the day.  It was very windy, so was quite pleasant. We decided to spend the heat of the day inside, doing computer "stuff" - Peter blogging, and recording his voice reading The Hobbit, for his coming grandchild (William's baby that is due in October), and me catching up with the bills, and the blogs.
  Had our Sunday evening family Hangouts call, and our monthly sibling/cousin Zoom call.  Always nice to "see" and chat with everyone.  Made dinner and called it a night.

Kanopolis State Park marina and beach photos--high waters damaged a lot of the marina:

July 27 - traveling on to Kanopolis State Park, Marquette, Kansas

  We left early in the morning, after a very pleasant breakfast with Chris and Jeanne Boetig.  The terrain was very interesting.  It had changed from corn fields on both side of the road, to prairies with some cattle, and a lot of rolling hills.  It was quite rolling hills, with very expansive vistas, between Kansas City and Manhattan, Kansas.  I was surprised it was so hilly, as I always thought of Kansas as flat corn fields.
  We had a bit of trouble finding the State Park, as the address on the website was no longer accurate.  Fortunately, Peter had input a place (the State Park) into his GPS instead of an address.  This park is also located around a damned up lake.  Very large.  Unfortunately, it is super hot again today, though not as humid, with a nice breeze.  So we set up the RV--our site is a full hookup, and turned on the air conditioning-HIGH.  We drove around the campground to get our bearings.  But we were both wiped out by the heat, and returned to the RV cool air, and read.  After dinner, it had cooled off quite a bit, so we sat outside and read.  Very pleasant.
  A problem with the State Parks on the weekends, is that there are a lot of families, and the possibility of loud, late partying.  Our next door neighbors partied with other friends (about 15 of them), with their music playing outdoors, until about 11:30 pm.  Oh well.

Kanopolis State Park photos:

July 26 - Fort Leavenworth, KS and the gun firing range

  Chris took us on a tour of Fort Leavenworth, were he used to teach and work.  It's big (although he says it is one of the smaller Forts).  It is mostly a command and general staff school now.  Its for officers in the middle of their career, helping them move to the next level.
  We toured the Frontier Army Museum, located inside the Fort, which was very well done.  Showing the history of Leavenworth.  The Oregon trail and the Santa Fe trail both started from Leavenworth.  The Fort also had a big cemetery for people killed in action, and a nice park dedicated to the military contributions made by blacks, through out US's history.
  In the afternoon, Chris took us to the gun range.  He is a gun collector.  Peter was hot to shoot some of his guns, so we went to the range.  Since I was there. . . I might as well try.  We shot both pistols and rifles.  I actually hit the target (so what if it was only 7 yards away).  I also hit the one with the rifle that was 15 yards away--most of the time.  Surprisingly to me, Peter did very well with both the pistol and the rifle.
  We went out for a very pleasant dinner.

Fort Leavenworth photos:

THE GUN RANGE photos:

July 25 - Leavenworth, KS and visit with Peter's friend

  We drove through, all the way across Missouri and over the Missouri river into the city of Leavenworth.  I was surprised how pleasant the Missouri countryside is.  Farmland and cornfields on all sides, with rolling hills  and lots of green. 
  Peter has connected through Facebook with a man, Chris Boetig, who went to his high school, a year behind him.  But who has a surprisingly similar scope of interests as Peter.  AND, Peter has definitely met his match in Chris with regards to his ability to talk--about many different topics.  AND, they both really enjoy discussing anything to do with the topic of war.  Chris was a career army officer, and subsequently a Dept of Defense civilian.  Newly retired.  We spent two nights at their house in Leavenworth.  His wife, Jeanne, volunteers to teach the spouses of the officers coming to Fort Leavenworth for a year school program various classes--English, quilting, and a really neat book/origami/scrapbook class.  We had a great time visiting with them. 

Chris and Jeanne Boetig--Barbeque dinner photo:

July 24 - Hanging with Mark Twain (State Park)

  The weather has turned a bit cooler, thank goodness.  We did our morning hike, 1.3 mile loop through woods, overlooking the lake.  Then we drove over to the nearby Buzzard Roost picnic area and overlook.  Great views.
  Since the campground has laundry facilities, I took advantage of that.  And, I have finally caught up with this blog.  The Michigan vacation got me sort of behind.

Mark Twain State Park hike:

Buzzards Roost Picnic and overlook photos:

July 23 - Hannibal, MO, Home of Mark Twain

  We decided to go into the nearby town of Hannibal, MO.  The birthplace of Mark Twain is actually in Florida, MO, just a few miles from our campground.  We actually stopped at the Homestead museum to see the 2 room cabin he was born in.  But, his family moved to Hannibal, which is where he grew up, and from which Samuel Clemens got much of his inspiration for Tom Sawyer and Hunk Finn stories.  As well as for when he became a steamship pilot on the Mississippi river and wrote. Life on the Mississippi".
We toured the Mark Twain Museum, showing his life story.  All over the town, there are Mark Twain-related shops and items.  We had lunch in a very hip coffee shop and walked about town.  Then we went on a riverboat sunset/dinner/live music cruise.  The singer/musician was great, the dinner passable, the weather perfect, the sunset delightful.
  As this is July 23rd, I kept thinking of my wedding to Ed Pless, on 7/23/1972, 47 years ago.  And of the fact that he did a month-long canoe trip down the Mississippi river, and here we were, cruising down the same river 47 years later.  Ah, the cycles of life.

Coffee shop and Mark Twain photos:

Riverboat sunset cruise:

Huge, long tugboat