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This Oughta Be Good

Travel > The Midwest Road Trip
 

The Midwest Road Trip

My current camera doesn't take as good photos at 65 miles per hour as my previous one that wore out, so my success rate is lower.

Mid-Kansas. It is supposed to be of the fence posts carved from stone (a Kansas specialty), but note the tree on the horizon that looks like a giant bear.

image

When you fly over the United States, looking down, you see crop circles. Here is what they look like from the ground - the square corners are planted in other crops or left fallow. This one probably had a grain crop that has already been harvested.

image

Dodge City, Kansas - home of Boot Hill and Wyatt Earp and all that.

image

This was taken at dawn, so the light wasn't good. It reminds me of a cartoon I saw years ago: "the middle of nowhere is somewhere to somebody."

What I don't have pictures of is the thousands of wind turbines that dot the Kansas and Oklahoma landscapes. Pre-dawn, the red lights on them to warn off aircraft are synchronized to all flash on at the same time. I kept wondering how they managed that.

posted on Aug 30, 2015 2:01 PM ()

Comments:

My first boss at The Times was from Dodge City. His father owned a newspaper and he became an international journalist. He retired down here and Ed and I would join him for lunch in Sarasota every couple of months or so. He died two years ago.
comment by tealstar on Aug 31, 2015 10:27 PM ()
Ah yes I remember Wyatt! Not a bad chap!
"are synchronized to all flash on at the same time. " If it was in NY or Miami they would have the lights flashing to songs!!
comment by greatmartin on Aug 30, 2015 8:54 PM ()
More flashing would have been more interesting - I could have made up a song to go with it.
reply by troutbend on Aug 31, 2015 7:28 PM ()
A tree in Kansas! What a discovery!
comment by hobbie on Aug 30, 2015 7:21 PM ()
Lots of millet, and the wheat had already been harvested, and a few fields of sunflowers.
reply by troutbend on Aug 31, 2015 7:38 PM ()
The panhandle of Oklahoma and Kansas are terrible. You are lucky to see
any tree, especially one shaped like a bear...definitely not a scenic
trip. Oklahoma City is the dividing line. It starts to get pretty as
you go towards Arkansas.
comment by elderjane on Aug 30, 2015 3:30 PM ()
Driving in the dark is a good way to miss out the boring landscape. I stopped at that 7 - Eleven on Reno that had the cheap gas to top off the tank. I was out there thinking, 'What the heck am I thinking, this might be a sketchy part of town.' But it worked out okay.
reply by troutbend on Aug 31, 2015 7:41 PM ()
Cool pictures! Glad you had a fun time. I've never wanted to visit Kansas... Even tho that bear tree looks cool I still wouldn't need to go there.
comment by kristilyn3 on Aug 30, 2015 3:24 PM ()
Kansas has kept its traditional look: sunflowers, windmills, stone fenceposts, and now windfarms. But it's still very flat and monotonous.
reply by troutbend on Aug 31, 2015 7:33 PM ()
Quite a feat, I'm sure, all that synchronization. Glad you had a safe trip.
comment by jerms on Aug 30, 2015 3:08 PM ()
It's not a bad trip, shorter than going to Las Vegas. I'm always surprised at how easy it is to find Jeri's house.
reply by troutbend on Aug 31, 2015 7:31 PM ()

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