Kismet

Kismet is a cute little town perched atop the windiest plateau we've ever experienced in Kansas. The Southwest Agricultural Center and Kismet General Store / Mexican Food buildings are the gatekeepers of the town's main street. There's a park tucked in among the houses, which is probably necessary to keep the children from blowing away in the High Plains wind. Kismet has a beauty shop, a ball field, and a school. There were lots of Trump and Kansas City Chiefs yard signs sprinkled throughout the town.

The town seems very stable and community minded, with a city hall, library, and community pavilion. Myrick said he wanted to live here, but I can't imagine ever living in a place with such gusty weather.

Arkalon

From what we could tell, the town that used to be Arkalon is now mostly a natural gas plant of some kind. Construction wouldn't let us get close to it, so we parked atop the windiest hill we have ever seen and tried not to get blown away while we took a picture. I was seriously afraid the wind would tear my door off as I exited the van.

The stress of the situation drove us to snacking at 9:40 a.m.! We did glimpse the natural gas facility itself, but we did not get any good pictures of it.

Liberal

Liberal is a big town, for southwest Kansas! It has a Wal-Mart, many restaurants, hotels, local businesses, fairgrounds, parks, a high school, and some museums. Also, a chain of gas stations hilariously named "TOOT'n TOTUM."

We used this city as our home base for the weekend. The pool at our hotel served as a carrot for the kids, who were consistently well-behaved despite some really long hours in the car. 

The night we arrived, we had dinner at El Amigo Chavez. The food was tasty, and a stranger bought us dinner! It reminded us of our favorite local Mexican place in Topeka, but with hotter salsa.

Liberal is the home of the The International Pancake Day Race and Hall of Fame, but the building was closed during our visit, as was Dorothy's house. We did enjoy playing on the Oz-themed playground, though. 

As we drove around town Monday morning, the winds were so high we almost thought we saw Dorothy's house start to lift in the gusts.