Kansas. Who'd a thunk!!

We left CO after one of the strongest hail storms we have ever seen there the day before.  We still hit bad weather for about the first hour in Colorado.  Fortunately, we got to Payton after the hail came down but it was like driving through heavy slush in heavy rain, quite a combination.  Once we got through all that, we had periods of rain and constant overcast skies but no more really bad weather.





We were staying in Kansas the first two nights and they had severe weather warnings, even possible tornados, for over the two days we were going through the state.  We had some rain periods but nothing bad and I am so glad.  We are safely tucked into our hotel for the night.  Hoorah.

Doug occasionally catches a show called Aerial America on the Smithsonian channel.  I have seen a couple episodes and it is really a good show.  It goes state by state in America and talks about the highlights of that state while showing aerial photography.  He caught one on Kansas and had a list of places he wanted to stop at.  Who would have thought that this kind of topography existed in Kansas?

When I think of Kansas, I think of flat terrain, farm country, and getting across I-70 as fast as we can.  You expect Kansas to look like this


so Monument Rocks National Natural Landmark outside Oakley, KS was a surprise.  It is buried in farm country so in all of these places, we had to drive down county dirt roads for a few miles to get to them but they were worth the effort.  Different from what you expect when you think "Kansas", for sure.

Today we were north of Salina, KS at Rock City.  This place has a small fee and a gift shop.  The grouping of rocks is within a small area, as they all were, but so interesting.  The rocks are left over from when the area was an inland sea, many millennium ago.


The second stop, a few miles south of Salina, was Mushroom Rock State Park.  I just love the texture of the rocks.  They are not layered, even though they look like it, but are solid rock.

These three areas are part of the "8 Wonders of Kansas".  You never know what a state holds until you get off the beaten path but it's worth the effort to do so.  Ain't road trips fun!!!