Tallgrass Prairie, July 6, 2010

The ride from Overland Park, KS to the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve should have been 2 hours or so. But Bambi (AKA our Garmin) got confused and directed us to bypass the correct exit. In most eastern places, we could just drive a mile or so and turn around. But this is Kansas, and the only option for us was to drive 19 miles to the next exit, and 19 miles back--about a 40 minute detour.

But before that, the ride on I-35 turned a bit hairy, as we drove along in relatively light traffic, and noticed that something had flown off a vehicle ahead of us. A few seconds later, as we neared the vehicle in question, we realized that what had become airborne was 2 tires and half the axle from the RV someone had been pulling. We were amazed that the driver did such a great job controlling his trailer, and was able to pull to the side of the road without incident.

Our destination, as I said, was the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve near Strong City, Kansas. Tallgrass prairie once covered 140 million acres of this country. Within a generation the vast majority was developed and plowed under. Today less than 4% remains, mostly in the Kansas Flint Hills. Opened in 1996, the preserve protects a significant remnant of the once vast tallgrass prairie. The preserve itself is about 11,000 acres, in a unique private/public partnership between the National Park Service (the primary land manager), The Nature Conservancy (the primary landowner), and the Kansas Park Trust (cooperating bookstore and promotion). If you get here by 11:00, you can take the bus ride around the preserve. As long as there are 2 people, the bus will run. Obviously, this place is not heavily visited. But because of Bambi's screw-up, we arrived late and landed up touring the place on foot. We hiked a 3.8 mile trail that took us into pastures over hills and into a meeting with some curious cattle. About 40 cattle gathered in the middle of the trail through which we had to walk, a few of which seemed not too happy to have us there. They bellowed and postured, but a bit of "shushing", had them moving along, and the trail opened once again. We also saw the 14 bison that call the preserve home. Thankfully, the weather was somewhat overcast, so most of our walk was reasonably comfortable. The sun came out for the last 1/2 mile, making it VERY uncomfortable and sweaty. This is a beautiful place of rolling hills and sky: certainly worth the visit.

We are spending the night in Hays, KS, and heading to Larry and Rose's in Denver tomorrow.