Tuesday morning I left the hotel at about 9 AM and, after refueling, headed to the museum area north and west of city center. I made it to two places - Botanica and Keeper of the Plains.
Botanica - Hidden at the end of Museum Road (and up against a golf course) is a peaceful series of gardens. It's sort of a sanctuary for people, but also for birds and butterflies. Among the different gardens are places to sit and relax, a few fountains and several statues. I also liked an odd contraption (it's in the sample image) that looks like it has a couple of microscopes on some flowers. In fact, if you look in the lens, you see a kaleidoscope effect.
Since I was there around 9:15, I was one of the first guests. There was one tour of kids (that I kept away from) and one or two dozen workers cleanup of the gardens. I suspect many are volunteers, but it was kind of nice just to be walking around with mostly just the workers.
The gardens weren't the best I've seen, but they were nice. The place was opened in 1986 or so and has probably been growing gradually.
Keeper of the Plains - This actually refers to a large statue at joining of the Arkansas and Little Arkansas Rivers. There is a little park around the statue set up, I think, by the Mid-American All-Indian Center which is just next the park. What I thought was very neat were the two bridges that allowed you to cross from the banks opposite the statue over to the park area. I realized after reading some signs that there had been a show at 9 PM Monday night at the park (some sort of lights and fire show). I remember reading this but didn't not it down on my list of activities. Oh well.
After spending time at the park and walking back it was about 10:45 AM which was a little ahead of schedule. I headed out of Wichita and on toward Kansas City. I had a bit of trouble leaving the city. The exit I planned to take to the interstate was closed. Fortunately, there were people out directing drivers to get where they needed to go. I basically went back on the street I was on and got on the next entrance a few miles up the road.
Here's a slideshow of the photos from my second day in Wichita.
The trip to Kansas Citywas uneventful until about an hour before the city. It had been overcast all day but hadn't rained. However, as I got closer to Kansas City, the clouds were getting darker and darker. When the rain finally started, it came down very hard -- the windshield wipers were on ultra-fast and I could only see about one or two cars ahead of me. As I mentioned yesterday, this made me a bit nervous since I haven't dealt with much rain in the past 20 or so years and certainly nothing this driving in a long time. The rain did ease up as I got in the city and did stop for a little bit, although never when I was taking pictures. Due to time and other factors (according to the guide books most of the interesting stuff was on the Missouri side of Kansas City) I only stopped at two places. Sample photos are in my next post.
Heading out of the city, my next stop was Omaha Nebraska. What I didn't realize was that all of my driving would be in Missouri and Iowa rather than Kansas and Nebraska. It turns out I didn't follow the exact directions I had printed out (I used a simpler route), so my distances were off. I also didn't realize that Council Bluffs, Iowa is right across the river from Omaha.
Somewhere in Missouri I realized I was definitely in Corn Country, seeing field after field of corn in various stages of growth. I also noticed several road signs that appeared to be blown down (sorry no pictures). I also noticed an odd Missouri road sign convention where they use a couple of letters to mean something - I have no idea what. I assume it's in the owners manual when you come to live in Missouri.
Moving into Iowa there was still lots of corn. However, I witnessed something I don't think I've seen since I moved to California. There was construction happening which caused the two directions to be moved all to one side or the other of the freeway (yes, I have seen this many times). What surprised me was that there weren't any cement barriers between the two streams of traffic. I assumed that since these had come into use, everyone used them. The last time I remember dealing with that was driving from San Jose to Santa Cruz and that had barriers put about a decade ago. I guess it's good to get out once in a while and see the rest of the world.
Finally, after consulting some other maps, I made it to Omaha without getting lost. The getting lost part happened when I tried to get into Omaha. The exit I was supposed to take was blocked off for construction. The detour actually just turned me around and I entered going south rather then north. Then I took the wrong exit off the highway and got turned around. Plus, downtown is primarily one-way streets. I wasted a good fifteen minutes trying to get to the hotel. I ended up parking nearby and walking to the hotel.
Once checked in everything was good. I walked down to Old Towne and had a nice Italian dinner.
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