Some days are diamonds . . .

Cheryl: some days are stone . . . like yesterday mushing across Texas and part of the Oklahoma panhandle to Kansas. We drove and drove and drove through endless grassy prarie dotted with corn, alfalfa, and wheat fields to get to Dodge City, Kansas. In our book, Dodge turned out to be a bust, and this morning we're ready to get the H... outta, well you get my drift. Can you say, "tourist trap?" Frank will post pictures, and you'll get the idea. We ate dinner at Matt's Steak House which turned out to be a "family" kinda place filled with, well kids and parents. My filet was excellent, but we both decided Matt's is the kind of place where they shovel food rather than serve it. Sigh. Sorry we don't have something more exciting to report, but at least today has started out cool and breezy. Walking the dogs quickly turned into pure pleasure looking out over the golds and greens of the Kansas landscape from high on a hill. It seems life's simple pleasures come along at just the right time to save us from our "great expectations" and remind us to savor just being alive and breathing. A cuppa tea outside at the picnic table under the trees sure made for a promising start to another day on the road.

Frank: The actual mileage from Tucumcari to Dodge City was 288 miles, not 188, so I'm really glad we stayed there instead of trying to get here from Gallup. The drive was a lot of long open miles like Chery said, but I liked it! I an constantly amazed by the amount of open space out here.

We stopped at in a little city park in Liberal, Kansas, made a nice lunch, walked the dogs, and sat under a big old shade tree. Small town America! It's great!

As we approached Dodge City I said to Cheryl, "We may have to stay over an extra day to be able to see it all," as I was expecting something like Tombstone only four or five times larger. Ha! My bad! "Dodge City" is a modern simulation of a reproduction of a fake, mock-up, theatrical set, of a stylized western "town" about the size of a small strip mall. Fifteen minutes and you've done it all. They wanted $10 a head to go into the "town" for a walk abound so we bought two sqished pennies and passed. I took a photo through the fence but I have to buy a cable for my camera to off-load it so I will try to do it later.

Catch you on the flip side,
Frankie, Cheryl Kay, Peanut and the Rapper