Topeka KS and the Kansas State Capitol…

Since we are close to Topeka and we like check out state capitol building we made a daytrip to towns. The Capitol was completed in 1903 and is actually 17 feet taller than the Nation’s Capitol in Washington D.C. Listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1971 this is one of the most interesting buildings we have visited. We parked in the parking garage under the capitol (free for two hours) and entered the ground floor lobby. This appears to have originally been the basement as the columns of local limestone blocks gives the feel of being in a cave with a secret passageway. 

At the visitor desk we received a brochure to do the self paced tour and wandered throughout the unique, ornate structure. Murals and art were scattered throughout the building and the building had more copper inside than any building we have ever seen Copper banisters, columns and staircases were everywhere. Some historical perspectives are given and we even found it interesting that both Clyde Cessna and Amelia Earhart were notable Kansans.

After we completed our tour together I wanted to do the Dome Tour, a guided tour which takes visitors up a winding staircase treating them to spectacular, breathtaking views to the top of the dome. Upon hearing the tour would be 296 steps up skinny, see-through staircases Sharon opted to forgo the tour because of her fear of heights. She decided instead to take a walk all the way around the exterior to see the sculptures located at each corner around the structure.

It really is an exciting climb to the top. The tour required us to climb all the the 296 steps with several stops at various levels to listen to information from our tour guide. If you look at the above right photo you will see the stairs going pretty much straight up from where the people are standing. You can also see people standing at the next level above them. At each level a few people would decide they didn’t want to go any further due to their acrophobia (fear of heights).

As we reached the mid-point we were treated to views above the inside dome (photo above left)and underneath the outside dome (photo above right). The last set of steps took us up to a tight spiral staircase and eventually through a door to the cupola. We were finally outside and most of us were glad since it is rather warm inside the dome!

The cupola is just below the statue at the top of the dome which is a Kanza Indian warrior. If you look closely at the photo below and left of the top of the capitol building you can see a hand rail with a door behind it. That is the cupola we walked around to see the city. As I said before it was pretty exhilarating. I even attempted a selfie (below center) to record my experience…

What a great 360 degree perspective I had at the top of the city of Topeka. After walking all around the top we were allowed to descend at our own pace. I went down rather quickly because the inner areas are quite hot with all that glass and copper on the top dome. After finding Sharon we headed over to the Blind Tiger Brewery where we each enjoyed a nice craft beer.

At the brewery a few locals told us about the first Friday art walk in the NOTO  Arts district of town. So we drove over to check it out and wandered around several of the galleries before we heard some live music that we decided to check out. What a find this turned out to be as there was not only a great sounding band, but also free grilled hamburgers, hot dogs, chips, cookies and craft beer – yes entirely FREE!!! We stayed for a while before returning to the lake discussing how we really, really enjoyed our day in Topeka.

NOTE: Next up is a day trip to Kansas City Missouri. We have traveled a short distance to the Prairie Band Casino & Resort RV Park where we will stay one day to do laundry and enjoy full hookups for a change…

University of Kansas and Lawrence, Kansas…

Our first day staying at Rock Creek COE park at Lake Perry, we drove the short distance over to the town of  Lawrence, Kansas. We wanted to visit the University of Kansas, Lawrence (founded in 1865) campus located there. We were familiar with Kansas as Texas A&M played them in all sports when we were in the Big 12 Conference. At these sporting events we heard them chant, “Rock Chalk, Jayhawk” and always wondered about that saying. Below is an explanation from the campuses web site:

"Rah, Rah, Jayhawk, KU" repeated three times. The rahs were later replaced by "Rock Chalk," a transposition of chalk rock, the name for the limestone outcropping found on Mount Oread, site of the Lawrence campus

Mount Oread, nicknamed “The Hill” is where the campus is found and it is quite a steep hill indeed (yes, Kansas is quite hilly over here). We read that the university had three museums so we stopped in at the University Natural History Museum and there we learned that sadly the other two were closed.  One was temporarily closed for remodeling and the other was permanently closed to reduced funding.  We were disappointed to miss seeing The Spencer Museum of Art which is considered one of the nation's top university art collections.

After our University walk, we took a stroll down Massachusetts Street in downtown Lawrence where we found a quite vibrant and eclectic downtown area. There was lots of energy there and we enjoyed the interesting architecture. This is certainly the type of town we could see ourselves living in. This five-block long downtown district was a delight! After our downtown walk we checked out the 23rd Street Brewery  and found a wonderful happy hour in full swing. We had great conversations with the locals and enjoyed one dollar 10 ounce crafts during their 3 to 5pm happy hour (definitely one of the best craft beer happy hours we have run across).

  

Hiking the Konza Tall Grass Prairie in the Flint Hills of Kansas…

While many of us love to hike in the mountains and love to stroll along the beaches in our beautiful country few will ever experience hiking in a tall grass prairie. Why? Because there are very few remaining true tall grass prairies in the USA and because most can be found in the so called “fly over” states. Some can be found in our home state of Texas but even there only 1% of the original 20 million acres of tall grass prairie remains. In fact the tallgrass prairie is the most endangered large ecosystem in North America!

Upon our arrival in Manhattan, Kansas a friend of mine whom I worked with back at Texas Parks and Wildlife (thanks Robert) told me about a nice tall grass prairie hike in Kansas called the Konza. The Konza is an 8,600-acre native tallgrass prairie preserve on mostly private land which is co-managed by Kansas State University and the Nature Conservancy. The Konza Prairie was previously a working cattle ranch and now is being managed to maintain its tall grass prairie.

Once home to large herds of bison Tall Grass Prairies such as the Konza are scarce. When one sees this tall grass prairie for the first time they may look out over the flint hills and see a vast sea of nothingness or they may see a vast sea of waving grasses below an endless sky. How one sees the tall grass prairie tells how much they will truly enjoy what they see and experience…

Why preserve such grasslands? These Native grasslands protect our watersheds by reducing erosion thus limiting sedimentation in our lakes and reservoirs. This results in increased water quality and an increase water supply. Species of grass, insects, birds and mammals which had shown decreasing numbers are now protected and allowed to flourish. Lastly they offer great seed banks for planting in other tracts of land to increase the acreage of tall grass prairies world wide.

These prairies only remain unplowed because the soils in the Flint Hills which are very rich are also too thin to plow. The flint and limestone are shallow making this a poor choice for farmland. Thus the Konza has not been plowed and retains its native characteristics.

Tall grass prairies are dominated by native grasses such as big and little bluestem, Indiangrass, and switchgrass. Big bluestem is known to grow as high as 10 feet tall! Woody species such as buckbrush and smooth sumac are constantly trying to invade these prairies but grazing and fire keep them in check. Managed grazing and controlled burning are used at optimal times to help these prairies thrive.

Home to Turkeys, deer and quail these prairies also house many endangered and threatened species such as the Attwater’s prairie chickens, Sprague’s Pipit and Le Conte’s Sparrow. On our trip there were numerous Dickcissels singing atop the tallest plants. Bison have even been reintroduced here. Not all of the land is covered in grasses as the steep drainages along King's Creek are dominated by Gallery forests and will have large quantities of burr and chinquapin oaks along with hackberry, walnut and hickory.

Lots of wildflowers were in the early stages of bloom during our visit to the Konza and most notable were the large numbers of Butterfly Milkweed, Plains Yellow Primrose and Foxglove Penstemon. Of course with so many flowing plants there were numerous insects and the butterflies were loving the now blooming Butterfly Milkweed. Although it is early for wildflowers at least we were treated to some nice displays and colors.

On our 2.8 mile hike we were treated to vast open sky, an unending sea of grass, a limitless horizon and a grand array of life. The Tall Grass Prairie is a great city of natural and native species all surviving in a sea of "nothing." Thanks again Robert for recommending this wonderful hike.

NOTE: We are add another day here at Perry Lake, KS so we won’t leave til Monday. Then we will drive a bit north to one of two casinos not too far away then into Nebraska for a while…

Memorial Day Weekend in Manhattan, KS…

We left the Wichita, Kansas area since the weather was predicted to be dicey for the next day and moved north and east to Manhattan, KS. The drive of 138 miles was pleasant since we spent very little time on any Interstates. We pulled into Tuttle River Cove Park, a Corps of Engineer Park just north of Manhattan.

We took site #18 which sits atop a hill (yes I said hill) despite our expectation that much of Kansas would be flat. Actually Northwestern Kansas is hilly as we are in an area known as the flint hills. The countryside is scenic and even though the lake is brown from recent flooding we are enjoying great views from our hilltop site.

  

Staying with our theme of checking out Universities we drove 10 minutes over to Kansas State University. I remember them best when Texas A&M University was in the Big 12 with and the two schools met each other for the 1998 Big 12 tournament to determine the conference champion. I was fortunate to work the on stat crew for that big game in St. Louis MO when Texas A&M’s Sirr Parker caught the winning touchdown in double overtime in the end zone with time expiring… what fun that was!

The campus is interesting in that the older buildings (late 1800’s) were all built with native limestone while the more modern buildings weren’t and are therefore much less interesting architecturally. There is a small amount of art scattered around the campus and we found some of it quite interesting.  Surprisingly for a major University there was very little art in their public spaces. The campus is undergoing a lot of construction which made it difficult to get around. It sure would be nice to see the campus when it is all completed.

The next day we decided to go and see the Konza Prairie Biological Station which is a Tall Grass Prairie managed by the Kansas State University but I want to pen another blog to talk just about that. Otherwise the only other thing we did was walk around the area known as Aggieville. Aggieville is really nothing more that a few square blocks of bars and eateries but you can certainly tell that after about 10:00 pm or on football home game weekends this place is certainly hopping.

 

We also found a nice brewery in town called Tallgrass Brewing Company where we sampled several of their beers and thought their Buffalo Oatmeal Cream Stout was their star product. Others were good but not nearly as complete as the Stout was. We leave to go to another COE park today in Perry Kansas where we plan to stay about four days, where once again we will make plans for where we will go next depending on the weather...

NOTE: We are currently at Perry Lake for four nights at a COE park in Perry, KS. We aren’t sure where we will go next but we are always watching the weather…