Final dinner was had at the campsite, followed by sorting out flight details.

The following day was a low key one. Even though I woke up at 8am, I stayed in bed until about 9.30am. I packed and handed in the essentials back to the office. The reverse of what happened to get to Yosemite National Park was now happening. Everything was all good to downtown San Francisco. After getting off of the train I had to get back to the first HI I was at in San Francisco to get my luggage bag. Slight problem, I lost the code for my bag and also where the bag was. In the end I had to go to the lady in reception to help me. Everything would have worked out perfect, but doing this now made everything quite the rush.

Finally, with all the bags in my possession, I was able to get to the train station and catch the train to the airport. I ended up being one of the last few to make it onto the flight booking. Everything ended up being for the better. There was minimal time to wait for boarding of the plane. Once on the plane I was asked about my baby. Apparently I was meant to take the baby from the start of the trip back with me. The people at Air NZ were unable to get rid of the kid situation for me. One benefit to this was having the extra 4 or 5 inches for leg room.

The flight was smooth. Waiting for the transfer in Auckland, I chatted to a family that had come back from Italy and were getting ready to go back to Sydney. The boy was pretty entertaining, the dad fairly cruisy, the daughter dainty, cute and knowledgeable and the mum was frequently being embarrassed by her son.

So, finally in Australia, I got all of my things back with no hassles and went about visiting some friends around Melbourne. The plane landed at about 9.40am on Monday 21 May, where I had left at 9pm on Saturday 19 May.

The great thing about when I had come back home was that mum was not expecting me, so ringing the doorbell I was getting ready for anything. Mum opened the door, looked at me for a moment and kind of screamed out in surprise.

On a side note: I know only several people have been bothered to read all this, and there is a lot of information held through out this, but this is basically a journal for myself. Anyone who has read a majority of what I have published deserves a beer from me, it has been a hell of a lot. I hope you are all willing to keep on with my African trip (mid August to mid September), as well as Europe (mid September to mid March).

Side side note: Title is because I realised, too late, that I was meant to leave the country a day earlier.

While on the bus, the driver kind of pointed out where the Upper Yosemite Falls were (U.Y.F.). Several minutes later he showed us the stop for the start of the hike. It was definitely going to be a challenge. I walked to a sign that pointed out where the official start was for the UYF walk, here there was a mentioning of over 60 switchbacks (this is a switchback:

Walking back to the train to San Francisco, I realised that I had been holidaying too much on these holidays and were unable to keep to one of the rare few schedules needed. I thought it best to get an experience at another HI. Here, I made a phone call to the HI near Yosemite to tell them about me not coming in. These people had no idea I was even coming in. I had booked for the HI when I was in Mississippi (A month). Due to this error, I was upgraded for a couple of nights. This was then to change for the Friday night, where I would go into the dorms.

To make sure there was no sleeping in, or ability to miss the required Public Transport, I took everything easy. I just stayed at the HI for the rest of the day and relaxed. Sleeping in was no issue as well as I had picked up food previously.

Waking up relaxed and ready to be waiting, instead of rushing, I was able to share breakfast with a semi professional musician from Australia. This guy had ventured around from the SA regions to the SE NSW region. In NSW, he was now working in an industry to try and allow for the indigenous population to stay fit and healthy. He was getting ready to travel north of San Francisco, while I directly East of San Francisco. So, train to near Amtrak, then a 40 minute walk to the Amtrak station, then an hour wait, followed by a 6 hour ride on good old Amtrak. Getting to the needed stop then called for another 30 minute wait for the bus that would drop me near the needed HI stop. On the bus I ended up talking to the guy next to me, where his mum had been a high profile worker in the Atlanta Olympics, he also knew a bit about Australia. Walking to the actual hostel was a bit of a challenge. By now the sun was already down and I was walking on a half mile upward track to the gates. At the reception people were a little confused with accommodating me, as I had paid for dorm rates but was situated in a Tent Cabin. Things got worked out, I dumped my things and hung out in one of the only internet spots on site (there were two sites with internet)

After going our own ways, I tried to update the blog at the airport, but otherwise all was uneventful until getting to Oakland Airport. A bus to the train station was the end of no events. At the ticket booth I was wondering why the machine was not flashing away for money, the reason, I realised, was a fault in the machine. About to move on to the neighbouring machine I was approached by a local Oaklandian. The lady thought with her initiative that she deserved some money. So, me being so generous, I went about handing her the equivalent of $1.25 USD. At this amount she started to scorn me, so I told her either accept it or give me the $1.25 USD. Upon this… compromise, she hastily left to harass someone else. Getting on the train was a bit of an adventure in itself. With my laptop bag now stuffed into the now spacious luggage bag was hidden to the general eye. Also in this bag was the Canadian Youth Group bag that David had given to me in the first week of coming to the country. With the hiking bag and luggage bag all surrounding me, I felt like an oversized tortoise being pushed through a petrol nozzle when trying to go through the ticket validating section.

Eventually I made it to downtown San Francisco and went straight to the hostel… yea, HI once again. After signing into the room, I dumped my stuff in the room and wanted a shower (yea it was warm in San Fran) but whilst in prep mode for the shower there was a guy and a girl in my room. Initially I thought these guys had hooked up while at the hostel, but found out something different. The girl had been on exchange at university in USA and was in the holiday section at the end of her exchange, when her ex-boyfriend had exclaimed that he was coming over as strictly friends. Sorry mate, but you really were ruining it for her. I think her name was Joanna. After my shower they had left, and some other guy was in. This guy, Matt, was also one of the North Irelanders that had come for a study exchange program. So, while sorting out all my gear for Yosemite NP, we were chatting when suddenly a whole bunch of people, predominantly girls, walked into the room. First thinking “At last, I have been asking for a co-gender room for so long and my wish is alive,” I then heard from the crew that they were only on the road together, but not in the room together. I hope I don’t forget any of the names, but there were Maurice (Mo), Matt, Joanna, Katie, Paula and sobby guy (I’ll call him Dan for now). Talking for a while I noticed their attention a bit diverted, whoops, I was only wearing my boxers. Quickly throwing on some clothes, I was invited to dinner with the crew.

Jumping into the Indian restaurant, there were definitely some Indian cuisines to be had tonight. We all picked relatively mild dishes, but with a touch of diversity to the next person. Dan and Joanna came back a little after us, but we all ended up finishing up at the same time and filled up. Heading back to HI we stopped by a 7/11 equivalent and bought some alcohol. Kind of thinking this was a starter to the night, I had not realised that there were several people in the group who were in fact under 21 still, poor buggers. We got the necessary beverages and headed on back to the girls room at the HI.

For majority of the night to follow, we were all pretty much laying into each other and sinking the drinks. I had to step out for a moment to finish the Yosemite packing. Coming back in, Mo remembered a few programs he enjoyed watching that were Australian: Prisoner, H block and Neighbours were his hot favourites. Oh yea Mo, for your sake, I have to mention that somehow the words fluff and fluffer are ultimately connected to us. The beauty of meeting some Irish/ North Irelander people is that they do know what Aussie Rules really is. Paula knew the latest recruit from North Ireland who is now playing for Collingwood (I got a message from here how a crew were at the pub over a month later at 10am watching Collingwood in a game).

Mo, Matt and I eventually went about hitting a local pub, as we were legally of age, and had a few. Because of the long day, and wanting to get things up and ready for the trip to Yosemite, I wanted to get enough zzz’s behind me.

With the meat put in a container with some of the marinate, we filled the cooler with the essentials and went about packing the car for the journey. The drive was mostly a pretty straight run, where at one stage we went through a region, near Branson, that was renowned for some inbreeding and peculiar locals. At the docks, we went about and chose the boat we were going to take out (man, boats are expensive to be hiring all the time). With the boat selected, and our gear onboard, Miro slowly reversed the boat out and we were on our way out onto the man made lake. With the speed limit being no wake, I had no idea what the potential of the boat was. Miro said that we should probably prepare ourselves, then he pulled down the… throttle, and the boat was off and away. We ventured around jumping over other boats’ wakes and having the wind tearing away at our faces. At one stage Vlady received a call from her friend we were meeting further down the lake. This lake was huge, definitely a lot larger then a couple of Melbourne’s largest water reserves stored at maximum capacity. The lake was also contained in both Missouri and Arkansas, with several launching points, several boat hire ports and several islands.

Getting to the point where Vlady’s friend was, sorry name forgotten, we slowly approached the pier where she went about stretching over and leaping onto the boat. Vlady’s friend worked at on of the places that have functions on the lake. One story that still is making me wonder how rich people get rich is that Vlady’s friend does things with the children of people from the million dollar club. The lake is a public entity, with the islands there for anyone to go on them while not affecting the nature within the region. The people from the group wanted to have 140 people on an island that would be lucky to have 40 people on it comfortably. Not only did they want 140 of their own people, they also wanted to have caterers and boat people to taxi people to an from the island. As Vlady’s friend mentioned the impossibility of having so many people on the island, the people of this club then went about asking why don’t the board of engineers go about emptying the lake enough so as to allow for an adequate amount of land to be temporarily inhabited by these people, and those who would be working at the event.

The people of this club wanted the event, from memory, on President’s day (or was it Memorable Day) and pay $100,000 for the displacement of the water and the caterers. Basically the people were told no, but the thing with the people in the working industry of USA is that they say things in the most appropriate and nicest of ways. So, the issue was still being dealt with on the day of the entry, but I think the answer would have been: You can use the island, but you can not book the island as being your own piece of property.

Boating around, we eventually stopped in three places throughout the day. Miro and Vlady were the two that were in the water every time. Oh yea, one time, while I was in charge of the directions, Miro’s hat went flying off of his head, and we had to turn around and he jumped in and collected the hat. Other then that little hiccup, the rest of the time on the water was fairly relaxing and a good way of having the closing end of my trip. We got the boat back with a few minutes spare and drove down to a park region to cook up the meat we had, this was a mixture of a late lunch and an early tea in the end. The Albanian housemate came along after his girlfriend’s graduation and we ended up having some salads, corn on the grill and meat on the grill too.

Well, people had their own way to go. Vlady’s housemate and girlfriend went about going to their next BBQ, also at the lake but at another section. We also dropped Vlady’s friend off at her car. Miro drove us through Branson, the capital of Missouri, where there was a replica of the Titanic (not to scale). The drive back was with us feeling a little bit tired, and a slightly quieter drive then what I had experienced in the past few driving escapades. Back at Vlady’s and Miro’s we had a bit of a sit around, where the aim was to watch the first few laps of the F1. I think it was in Europe somewhere (Monte Carlo). Bed.

We left for the graduation at a bit of a fine line in regards to final times. At the university, Ryan was one of the last in his group to get there but still with time to spare. Ryan’s family and I went about sitting in what we felt was the most appropriate place considering how full it was already. Slowly the people started coming in to the main playing field of the stadium. From the deans, to the lecturers then to those graduating. We could not exactly see where Ryan was sitting, but from seeing the way people were situated with the arrangement and the names were listed in the booklet we had received at the stadiums entrance, we were able to get an approximation of where he was sitting. The person prior to Ryan had been called, upon this we got the cameras ready and zoomed in as far as possible, both via the lens and via digital zoom. So, about 20 shots were taken. Ryan, once again, slowly disappeared into the wave of black gowns. After roasting for a short while, and a discussion on what we should do (stay longer or make a dash for it), we decided to go back to Ryan’s place.

After Ryan’s mum and brother meeting someone they knew, we got back to Ryan’s apartment. A short while afterwards Ryan came through the door. With barely a word said, I could feel something was not exactly right. Ryan mentioned something about the wording of his thesis not being precise in the various booklets and other information produced by the administration, except for the actual certificate. Ryan had done his thesis on writing in the Middle Ages that had a focus on the Old English writings (correct me where I am wrong). I could not remember the exact title, but I know there was definitely a big reason to be upset with what had happened. Within moments, Ryan had written an email to his aunt, as well as verifying what he had sent them was the correct title. Well, I would have been bloody p’ed off myself, so with whatever the outcome was, I hope it turned out the best.

It was now time to try and grab something to eat before the waves of people came from the graduation. We went to a place I had seen frequently, but had yet to dine at. Applebees was, I thought, a good place for a franchise. Sitting reasonably quick, and getting food reasonably quick we watched as the crowds rapidly grew after our arrival. By the time we left Applebees, the line for the people to be seated was already out of the door. It was not exactly a cool day.

Amanda had invited Ryan (and guests) along to where her family was staying. Here we were able to meet mother (again), father (again), sisters, aunts uncles, cousins, niece and grandma This time had to be cut short as Ryan’s family had to get back to their own things, and we had to start making a general way over to Springfield. Saying our goodbyes, and well wishes, Ryan and I were dropped back at his apartment to get his car. We started heading to a town that was renowned for having the yellow brick road. As we were heading that way, Ryan’s car managed to get a flat. Pulling over and checking the tyres, we had a flat due to a shard of metal being jabbed through both the wheel and the tyre. As Ryan was in the process of taking off the wheel a guy in a 4WD pulled over to see how we were handling the tyre change. I thought this was a remarkable thing, especially as this was also the first car to pass us. If in Melbourne, and two guys were pulled over with car issues, I doubt if anyone would even contemplate pulling over.

While starting to tighten the bolts to the tyre, Ryan received a call from his mum, telling her the situation we organised to meet at the town just before her home town of Iola. So, on the road again we met up with them at the corner of the two main roads in the town, this was also where the only gas station was and I think instead of a set of lights they had a four way stop. As soon as we had parked the car at the gas station, Ryan’s brother pulled up right alongside us. Switching the tyres, and getting a drink due to the weather beating down upon us, we ended up changing our original course of driving. Ryan’s and my first aim was to drive to a town with a yellow brick road, yes kind of ‘Wizard of Oz’ style, but this had to be changed to allow for the time needed to fix up the tyre properly and switching the tyres back again. This detour allowed for me to be able to see the sights of Iola, including the haunted theatre that Ryan had worked at, his house, various hang out spots and we also had the opportunity to wave to a couple of passing drivers; Iola, what a friendly town.

Getting the phone call, whilst at Ryan’s mum house, we ended up getting the tyre at Michael’s house, this was a fairly nice laid out piece of property with plenty of space for their two kids to play around on. Meeting the kids soccer mum and having a bit of a chat was delay enough for our adventure. The back way allowed for us to see sections that one probably would not want to spend too much time in. One section, apparently, was were the Mafia (of Kansas) would go about tying blocks to people’s feet, and dropping the bodies in water filled caverns that snaked along under the ground in tubular like tunnels.

Drive, drive, drive, the paths were kind of well tended to for the drivers of Kansas. The sign down the road was saying welcome to Oklahoma, here the road turned to mulch. The bitumen was poor quality, the roads edge had severely deteriorated and well, it really was not that pleasant to drive on. The aim was to at least say that I had been in Oklahoma, and this meant I had. We went down to the first main intersection, and went back in a North Easterly direction to Kansas. Just on the Kansas side of the border we had some huge dinner, I think I had some Okra.

Us having dinner, while still in Kansas, kind of made us understand that we needed to get a boogie on. So, after stuffing ourselves full, we got on the road again and soon enough were in Missouri. Driving along we saw some random signs in regards to certain XXX stores. Apparently there are a large number of XXX stores in the state of Missouri. When we first got into Springfield, I gave Vlady a ring to get the specifics on how to get to her place. Well, I kind of heard about 50% of what she said, with this limited knowledge we made it relatively close to her place. I think with the entire trip to Vlady’s place we only did one slightly incorrect turn, which was easily remedied.

So, finally at Vlady’s place we knocked on the door. Vlady opened the door and we oohed and aahed at each other, while hugging. The one thing that I really wanted to do was to meet Vlady’s boyfriend, Miro. Vlady was always saying that his humour was great to get to be a part of. So, Vlady gave us a run down of what she would like us to all do, while we were visiting for the weekend. After she had done this, Miro walked over to his little collection of hard alcohols and poured several glasses. Ryan and Vlady declined the opportunity, but I thought he couldn’t drink alone and this was a part of his culture. Feeling the burning texture going down the throat relatively smoothly was both over bearing but yet pleasing. We got Ryan’s and my bedding area sorted out, while getting ready to go to a Greek night out at an Irish bar (or something along those lines). Getting there I realised there were to be a battle. Ryan, Miro and I all tried to out do each other with buying the other people drinks. To make the others feel more appreciated I eventually declined in the battle. Vlady said that was a wiser thing to do, especially as Miro would feel offended by having the guest buying drinks. While at the bar we danced, drank and met some others who were originally from another country (Albania, Croatia nad several others). Oh yea, I forget his name, but the other person who shared with Miro and Vlady was the guy from Albania.

Several hours of frivolity led to the end of the night and us needing to get back. Sitting around at the apartment we chatted for a short while longer before retiring.

Dropping off Ryan’s car at his place, we went about doing a few things at the university for Ryan’s ceremony the following day. He was fitted with a Masters Gown. We also had a bit of a chat to his two supervisors, including giving a gift of some pretty ancient looking book on… Middle English literature. The chat was followed by another round, or two of disc golf. At the first course, Robin Hood maybe, we ended up giving up on following the path for two reasons: The floods had not receded properly (Still causing some marshy lands) and we kind of lost track of where the course went. At the other course, while it may have seemed I was the powerhouse, at the start, after a hole or two Ryan was the Tiger Woods of disc golf. At both courses we had a run in with the Poison Ivy. Realising that time was disappearing, we went off to look for an appropriate card for Ryan to get his… mom (note, not mum) then we headed back to Ryan’s apartment to get cleaned up for a little afternoon tea being held by the English literature department. Here we had groups ranging from lecturers, post graduate students coming to the end of their studies and postgraduates at the start of their studies. Amanda’s folks had also come in from their town of Great Bend, it used to be called Big Bend but was changed one time or another down the track.

The gathering was cut mid way by a small talk given by one of the lecturers (actually, I think it was one of Ryan’s supervisors), where Ryan and I went by Ryan’s aunt’s office to say all went well with our road trip (as well as a bit of sad reminiscing over the Greensborg events). In the morning, Ryan and I had already gone by Wal*Mart to gather some essentials for dinner. Ryan wanted to cook up a proper meal, and a bloody good job he did. This was not all of it, but from memory, he put together some kind of chicken dish on a bed of rice with asparagus, corn and possibly something else on the vegie side of things. We kicked it back, more to watch a show that was new on the box (a falsely accused terrorist, did that show last in the USA?) Well, satisfied with watching both ‘Ugly Betty’ and the terrorist, it was time for Ryan and I to wander down to the local water-hole, aah yes Natashas. Here Ryan and I played a few games of pool, had the free popcorn and slowly the crowd started gathering. Eventually Amanda and I started partnering in the pool, and we were not able to be kicked off the table. The skills of the game definitely laid in the hands of Amanda.

Due to everyone in the main group having the ceremony the next day, the group started dwindling. Before we left the pub, though, Ryan bumped into a few guys who were doing a pub crawl. Actually being more precise, the guys were doing pub golf. The aim with pub golf is to go through 18 bars. I think two beers is par, one beer is above par and three beers is under par.

Traveling south, towards Strong City, we managed to make it amidst the last Long Prairie Grass reservations. At the edge of the reservation stood a couple of buildings. One building was where a large group was having an educational school tour, we walked around the building’s cobble fence boundary, along a minor path and across a lake, to the Heritage Listed school building. Getting back to the car, we realised that a good part of the day had ticked on by. We headed through to Strong City, Ryan knew the guys who ran the main bar, and had worked there. We ended up going to a restaurant that was 4 star in the evening, but it was a bit more relaxed for lunch. After Ryan and I had a battle to whom was going to pay for lunch (Ryan went to extraordinary lengths to pay), I took a photo of the town centre and Ryan drove to an apparently central point of the Flint Hills. So, to reconfirm what was said in one of the first two entries of the Kansas entries, Kansas really is not just a flat barren place, it is also a rolling barren place, too; there are things to do in Kansas as a tourist, but the need for a car for several days will be essential. After hearing the tranquil sounds of wind going through the grass on the rolling hills, we slowly headed back to the car and to Emporia.

The sun was rapidly heading down for another nights sleep, creating a lazy feel in the sky with the softening of the sky. Traveling in a North Easterly direction, we wanted to get back to Emporia in time for the organised meal. A group of about 10 of us were meeting up for a meal at a Mexican resaurant. After demolishing a huge meal, and margarita, I could barely move. People had their own things to tend to, including several of us heading to see Spiderman 3. I think five of us went to see it, and five of us left disappointed, Ryan tried his best to give it some positive remarks. Standing out the front of the complex, we had the opportunity to play some games with some others but it was actually reasonably late already. So, after the chatting around the cinema complex for a while, Ryan and I headed back to his place.

We went back through the university and had a few things to do. I think it may have been this day when Ryan had an in class exam to give. While he went about doing it, I was in the office he shared with about seven, or so. other academics. OK, I am going to forget some of the people’s names, that is a given, but some of the people that I met through this situation included: Amanda, Laura, Victoria, Manni, then Ryan’s two supervisors (Melvin? And the guy who had done a fairly in depth research on cattle grids). Oh yea, I met a guy who constantly referred to his place of work as being the seven circles of hell, or along those lines.

After Ryan had finished with his supervision of his test, I did it as well and did OK, we went off back to his place. While walking back to his place the idea of Disc Golf surfaced. Well, it was a warmish kind of day. At the course, with several bodies of water, Ryan was easily the dominating player. After we had done about nine holes, in my uncoordinated ways, there was one disc that did not abide by my attempt. Several kids were wading through a small lake looking through it for someone else’s disc, apparently they were getting paid $10 each for the frisbee. Well, after my attempt, these kids were going about trying to find Ryan’s disc. Near 20 minutes worth of 3 people in the water proved worthless, sorry Ryan. We played with the remaining discs only for a short while following the incident.

People seemed to be busy doing their own things, where we were invited to a girls’ night out but declined. We declined either for their benefit, or ours, we are still not sure. In the end we decided to get a feed at a BBQ place just off of the main stretch of the city. This was a pretty awesome pile of food. Man, the way they eat in the Mid-West, just like in the South, was full of (unhealthy) delights. Places were already getting busier then typical, where this was due to more people coming in for graduation on the weekend. A good way to chew up the time was by us walking to and from the cafe. In the end we wandered around a bit. The heat of the day had dissipated, whilst the food still was in need to be walked off. Ryan pointed out specific places, as well as the history of Emporia a bit. We got up to the university and walked through a bit, where at one stage Ryan saw a student who probably was not too eager to talk to Ryan (the student had not done too well in his assessment). After the hour and a half worth of walking around, we eventually got back to Ryan’s place and saw the next item to entertain us… darts. This lasted for about the same amount of time the walk did, where by the time this was finished (Ryan was a sharp eye, but after all the games we turned out fairly even) we talked for a short while longer, then hit the sack.

Driving, that was a good portion of the day. Not all of the day involved only driving, well actually the remainder of the time in Colorado was driving. Back in Ryan’s home state, of Kansas, we got to one of the most violent towns of the western times, Boot City. The original plans for the city was to be a dry town while passage of (maybe) bison was occurring. Due to a region of the city being dry, just down the traveling road a bit, actually just outside of the dry region, the city was recreated. This allowance for alcohol, and lack of… authority, made Boot City one of the more violent cities in the region. The city itself had based itself on tourism. If anyone has been to Sovereign Hill, Ballarat, then you would kind of know the set up of the paying region of Boot City. The normal section of Boot City was trying to hold on to some of the more traditional ways of the region, in terms of buildings. Also, over the pavement were medallions symbolising various actors who had been in a movie filmed in Boot City, about the hardships of the time, and the criminal acts that took place. After seeing a few of these tourist attractions, Ryan wanted to show me one of the most unique overlooks, I’d like to say, in the world. Driving out of Boot City, we drove past a bunch of stencils of cowboys, then Ryan pulled out at a top of a hill. Behind a sign, we were able to overlook huge fields that were designated for cows. Not all of the fields had cows throughout them, but it could be seen that during peak time there was an intense number of beef on legs. As we could see, there were only about a thousand or two of cows.

After having a bit of a laugh at this tourist attraction, we went about driving the back way to where Ryan’s grandparents lived. Our aim was to see how close we could get to Greensborg, where the tornado had caused enough pandaemonium to allow for all the services, including the National Guard, to try and allow for some peace and order into the mess. The world’s deepest hand dug well was officially non-existent, and as we starting heading towards the Old Boot City there were signs saying no entry permitted within a certain distance to the affected area. Back road experience in Kansas, well, it was the most direct detour in this case. Getting onto the original road, we headed to Ryan’s grandparents’ town. Before getting to Ryan’s grandparent’s town, we went by the town that his mum was born in. The beauty with this town, too, was the fact that one of the local team’s names had recently changed. It had changed in conjunction with the recent addition of the latest tourist attraction, wind turbines. After the thrill of seeing over 60 turbines, we went to the town that Ryan predominantly grew up in, name forgotten but this was where his grandparents, as well as a couple of aunts, had spent a good part of their life in. After seeing several sites in the town, including the dining hall that three schools shared, seeing the house his grandparents were in for some length and the local cemetery, it was time to push on forth.

The town that Ryan’s mum had grown up in had had no traffic lights in, so while in the midst of training for driving, people would have to drive up to the nearby town that had one or two sets of lights in them. This town, with the traffic lights, also had another famous site to visit. Pawnee Rock was less then a couple of hundred feet from the surrounding low points. Now Pawnee Rock was renowned for the fact that there had been three, or four great tribes of the native Americans, who had used this vantage point to observe bison, initially, and then white settlers, finally. Before forgetting about everything that had happened, several days before this entry, maybe while we were climbing towards Little Devil Tower, we decided to have both child and man names in regards to the native Americans. I remember the man names: Ryan was ‘Hunting Bison,’ I was ‘Quiet Noise.’ Our child names were in reference to events that had happened while we were born: I was born during a sand storm and Ryan during a tornado. Any how, we got a few photos of this dimple in the land and moved on. Traveling as directly as possible to the Flint Hills, to see a castle, we were once again detoured. The good thing about Ryan and I traveling this detoured way was the ability to see the marshes of Kansas, where it had been a common theme to see some variety of bird life.

OK, so my memory is helping me in some of the right places, heading towards the Scandinavian town, in Kansas, Ryan showed me the site that would definitely raise eyebrows. On one of the high points of the Flint Hills was the Coronada Heights. This was a very basic castle like structure. The original aim was to attract families. Ryan and I managed to get to this place at a perfect time. People were non existent and the sun was coming down in the perfect motion. After us climbing around for near to an hour, we were starting to get a bit of the desire to eat. As we were heading off, a couple of cars came along. The people in the car were all looking like college students who were under 21. Ryan said that the whole attempt to make Coronada Heights a family attraction was over powered by the number of students that would come here, typically at sunset, and sink a few.

Driving through the nearby town (I think originally settled by a bunch of people from Sweden), we drove past a number of wooden horses. Apparently this was one of the draw cards to the town. Within a small area of one intersection, I was able to see about six or seven horses. We drove through the town and headed down to the road that was cut off at a point a bit South West of where we now stood. At the intersection, we headed in the SW direction for some Montana Mikes. This place, Montana Mikes, is the equivalent to the Outback Steakhouse, but for the state of Montana. As we were pulling into the steakhouse, fog was rolling in from the Southerly direction, bloody thick stuff this time. Lights were nearly clouded over and they were just across the road. In Montana Mikes we chose the non smoking section, but to no avail, the smoke was still able to waft through. While the food was OK, the service reminded me of the time in Memphis with Nick at the diner with the angry lady who looked like she hated life, except here the guy just seemed interested in trying to hop outside to suck down a cigarette.

Anyway, after our meal and under tipping, we headed back to Ryan’s place in Emporia.