"Kansas, My Home" a Kansas Travel Page by basstbn

I write about Kansas with fondness. I have lived here for all but four of my 63 years, and have at times muttered that it had no mountains or fantastic scenery, or that its people were a little on the conservative side. Its natural beauty is more subtle than majestic, but the people are the best you'll find anywhere. I wouldn't live anywhere else in the USA.

Most people know Kansas as an obstacle on the way to someplace else - they're either flying over or "flying" through on one of the interstates that intersects the state . Kansas is rarely a destination.

I hope you'll look at some of my Kansas pages, and if you never have the opportunity to see those places first hand, you'll at least appreciate my state a little more when you're whizzing down I-70 on the way to the mountains. Or maybe you'll break for more than a pit stop or to look at something other than the idiotic museum with the two-headed calf or the giant concrete prairie dog/tourist trap.

The state flag of Kansas plays homage to our heritage as an agricultural state as well as our history.

The motto (ad astra per aspera) translates "to the stars through difficulties" - a reference to the years of bloodshed as pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces fought to bring the territory in line with their philosophies. Read about "Bleeding Kansas" and visit some of the historical sites in the eastern part of the state such as Lawrence and Osawatomie.

Although Indian tribes were in Kansas as long ago as 10,000 BC, and the Spanish explorer Coronado looked upon the Kansas prairie long before the first European settlers migrated from the east, the state has a short recorded history when compared to other parts of our country or the world.

There is a lot of gold in Kansas. Not in precious metals, but in the ripened field of wheat, the glory of the sunflower, and the breast of the western meadowlark.

The sunflower, appropriately, is the state flower. It can be seen in abundance along the roadside or in fields from midsummer until frost, always looking toward the sun.

Travelers will see meadowlarks on the fence posts, but would enjoy them a lot more if they got out and took a walk in the prairie. Their complex, but melodic song is a burst of joy.

To see the gold of wheat, you have to be in Kansas at just the right time of year - from early to late June, depending upon whether you are in southern Kansas or northern Kansas. The wheat is at its peak of ripeness (and a certain golden color) for just a short time, and the harvest crews must move their convoys of combines to the right place at the right time - from south to north.