Eskridge (The Return!)

Eskridge is a town near Mission Valley School, where Myrick had a cross country meet. We've been here before, but only in the middle of the night to view the stars and planets at Farsight Observatory. It has a nice little downtown, with some shops and a café, where we had dinner after the meet. 

And, of course, an info kiosk. (But the Info Kiosk signs point to the wrong place! Fortunately, we found it anyway.)

Wilmington

Wilmington seemed like mostly a town of the past. It has a well-marked Santa Fe trail crossing and campsite, a historic Church of Christ, and a schoolhouse from 1870.

Bradford

There are a lot of vivid road names around Bradford:

Nighthawk

Green Ash

Bronc Rider

8 Mile

Mourning Dove 

Headwaters

Between here and Keene, we also saw some limestone walls surrounding charming old homesteads.

Bradford itself is just a house or two, plus Bradford Road, of course.

Keene

Keene was surrounded by rolling hills dressed in late-summer foliage, like a former fashion model clinging a little too hard to the past. The fields were full of corn with dried tassels waiting for the harvest, their papery leaves shivering in anticipation.

The town itself is a scattering of historic homes and barns along K-4. The cemetery sits near an aging church in the country a couple of miles west of town. 

Oh, and there’s also an info kiosk.

Eskridge

One night in August, our homeschool group took a field trip out to Farpoint Observatory, just outside of Eskridge. While the town itself has a very interesting history, we didn't make it downtown this time. Instead, we stood in the dark and gazed at the heavens.

Farpoint is the location where over 600 asteroids have been discovered, as well as one of the faintest recorded comets. Several very kind volunteers showed us various stars, planets, and other astronomical objects through a few different telescopes, including one that was two stories high and required us to climb a ladder to reach the eyepiece!

It was a good night, but a late one for us all.

Alta Vista

Micah's Musings:

Alta Vista is a quaint, scenic town on the rolling prairie north of Council Grove. It has some small businesses and lovely homes and churches. Just past the co-op and its tarped-down heaps of grain, there's a wonderful old wooden bridge that you can drive over -- it's an adventure to those of us who are used to big, concrete and steel ones.

Newbury

Not much remains of old Newbury except for the Sacred Heart Catholic Church, also called the Cathedral of the Flint Hills. Here's another traveler's thoughtful reflection on the church.

As we pulled up to the cathedral, it started to rain. We needed the restroom, so we braved the summer storm in hopes that the front door would be unlocked. It was. (We didn't see anyone around, though.)

We gratefully used the restroom, which was clean and welcome enough to convert even the roundest of Roundheads to Catholicism. Then, we knelt, prayed, and sang together in the big, beautiful sanctuary. It was a blessed break from our minivan on this cloudy Sabbath day.

"Come to Me. I will give you rest," say the Savior's words at the front of the sanctuary. How true those words are for a weary traveler.

Paxico

We had a free Saturday, so we decided to head over to the Paxico Meatloaf Festival and Car Show.

There was quite a bit going on there. They had marching bands, old west reenactors, some pretty sweet classic cars, tractor rides for the kids, and plenty of food vendors. Regrettably, the festival was so busy that they were out of meatloaf by the time we showed up (right around noon).

At first, it seemed like it was going to rain, but it stayed nice and dry the whole time we were there. The clouds also kept the sun from overwhelming our little crew, so we were thankful for that.

We noticed a lot of military personnel and armored vehicles on display. Nearly all of them were painted desert khaki. We even got our picture taken by an aerial drone! Of course, it was on the ground at the time. The picture wasn't great, so here's a picture of our boys in front of the drone instead.

Paxico is a neat little town. It seemed to have plenty of civic pride and some cute shops. We'll have to visit again for the blues festival in September.

Wabaunsee

Wabaunsee is a quiet little town with a big, loud history. It was founded by abolitionists in the years before the Civil War. Henry Ward Beecher, a prominent abolitionist, furnished rifles for the settlers; the firearms were reportedly shipped in crates marked "Beecher's Bibles" (though this may be more of a good story than a historical fact).

We wanted to visit the Beecher Bible and Rifle Church, but it was in use for a wedding. The groomsmen were dressed in leather vests and cowboy boots. You'd have a hard time finding a more countrified wedding, I suspect.

There wasn't much else to see in town, but Magen did take my picture at the corner of Chapel and Wabaunsee. We'd love to see inside the church, so we'll give that a shot next time we pass through.

(Pop Quiz: Can you spot the pun in the previous paragraph?)

Willard & Uniontown

We'd seen the Willard exit on I-70 hundreds of times, and even driven through the town several times, but we had never gotten out of the car there before. Unfortunately, there's not much to see in Willard itself: It is comprised mainly of homes and churches (and one home that looks like it used to be a church).

We did see an interesting sign in town for the Herbert Reinhard Green Wildlife Area, so we followed a hilly dirt road until we found it.

The wildlife area is located at the top of a hill across the road from a private cemetery. It turns out that this cemetery is all that remains of Uniontown, a settlement that was the largest in Kansas during the 1850s. It was burnt to the ground... twice. (You can read more about Uniontown's history on the Parks site, and here's another article about it hosted by Washburn.edu.)

We decided to hike through the wildlife area (which the Green family donated to the state and asked to be declared a refuge, with no hunting allowed). We also thought it would be a good opportunity to try our hand at geocaching, since the Uniontown Gold geocache was located in the refuge.*

The first half of our adventure was delightful. We really enjoyed seeing the Green family's old farm implements, and the trail was easy and well maintained. There were even some benches to rest on. As our treasure hunt continued, though, a few problems arose.

 First, our 2-year-old got tired of hiking, so he started crying whenever he wasn't riding on my shoulders. Then, our hunt for the geocache took us off the trail. This was a bit painful since none of us really had appropriate hiking shoes on.

My flipflop-clad feet attracted thorns at an alarming rate, and our 4-year-old accumulated numerous scratches on his legs. It also wasn't the easiest terrain for a momma in flipflops to navigate while wearing a baby in a Mobi wrap.

We were also a little leery of poison ivy. We didn't see much of it, but we did see enough to make me nervous about letting the boys go ahead of me.

After making our way through a couple of painful briar patches, we finally arrived at the treasure chest. The boys enjoyed the fast food kids' meal toys we found in it, and Magen and I enjoyed turning around to go back toward the car. The hike back was a bit more miserable because of our scratches and the boys' insistence on being carried. (They took turns riding on my shoulders.)

At last, we made it back to our climate-controlled, thorn-free van. We'd had a good time, but we were also glad for it to be done. Next time we go geocaching, we will be sure to dress more appropriately for the adventure. (We will also dress to repel ticks, as we found 2 of the little bloodsuckers on our 4-year-old's back at bathtime.)

* We had tried to go geocaching as we were leaving Topeka, but the cache we tried was hidden near a pretty busy golf course.  After dodging a few shots from the fairway, we decided we would rather run away and live to search another day.

Harveyville

You notice a lot of variety in fenceposts when you drive through the Flint Hills. The most common are modern, steel ones with a grim, spare efficiency.

Others are made of limestone: They are quarried from the deep earth, hauled up steep hills, and festooned with barbed wire like ancient lamas attired in saffron. Unchanged by time or weather, they smile inscrutably at the grassy hills rolling off toward the horizon.

Still others are wood - mostly Osage orange in this part of the country. They're tough, gnarled posts that look right at home out here on the prairie. They may be bent with time and wind, and charred by occasional pasture burnings, but they belong here as their steel and stone counterparts never could.

Harveyville reminded me of those wooden fenceposts. It didn't have the industry and polish of a town like Kansas City, or the intellectual aloofness of Lawrence. It wasn't gorgeous, but it was tough and strong and serviceable. And I felt right at home there.

We pulled into town at the end of a long day of exploration, and we were hungry. Lo and behold, D&C's Diner and Grocery LLC!

We weren't sure what to expect from this diner / grocery store. What we got upon walking in was a very sweet lady who apologized to us for the lack of the normal dinner buffet (it was Prom Night, so she didn't expect many customers).

We sat down in the eatery half of this building. Their menu offered a variety of foods. (And the back of the menu advertised a taxidermy business, some of whose "clients" were also displayed in the grocery half of the place.) We settled on waffles with bacon for the boys, and chicken bacon ranch pizza for Magen and me. It was yummy and very reasonably priced. We'd definitely return next time we're in the area.