Barreling through Kansas, landing in Colorado.

Monday, July 1st 2013

Kansas City was largely unfortunate.  We spent last night at Harrah's Casino, met some unusually unpleasant people in the service industry, and by uncontrollable force spent an hour or so gambling.  All losses!  Dinner was good....  Anyways, up early, and out we were, finally crossing the border into Kansas.

Then the speed limit increased.  This was good, considering how fat Kansas is.  Kansas is a pig.

We found the fancier Compton:

Only an hour outside of Kansas City, we stopped in Topeka, following signs for the Brown vs. Board of Education historic site.  The site is located in one of the four schools in Topeka that were Segregated for Black children before the Supreme Court ruling ordered integration nationwide.  This was the newest of the four black schools in Topeka, and was saved as a historic site in 1990.

Most of it was museum exhibits, but we learned a lot of history.  Many videos were playing on repeat in the rooms, showing all the violent opposition and hatred that practically exploded everywhere when integration came about.  So many people were quoting the bible, stating it demanded that we kept things segregated.   

It turned out to be a somewhat emotional learning experience for us both.  We enjoyed it, gathered ourselves, and moved on.

We found what is as of now the best coffee I have ever had!  This place was pretty amazing, and a sure surprise in this small town.  Interestingly enough, we had a chance to chat with employees and one of the owners there.  Apparently they have been researching sites in Manhattan and Brooklyn for a new space - very exciting.

They brew all the coffee they serve fresh, each cup, shown below:

And we're keeping this cup cozy.

Then we were off.  I-70 west for hours... and hours...

Nothing but farms, cows, hay, and tractors.  

The drive may have been long, mostly boring, but gosh it was beautiful.  I don't think these photos will justify the beauty of endless landscape, where it is green and yellow for as far as you can see.  The smell of the air was a freshness I can't describe.  For at least the first 3 hours, this was breathtaking.

Six hours later, we were in Colorado!

Which, for a while turned out to be much of the same as Kansas.

We strayed off the interstate onto US-24, going towards Colorado Springs.  It was interesting, a one lane highway through several very small towns.  The town of Colorado Springs is at the base of the Rockies, and seemed pretty nice.  As we got closer, the Rocky Mountains became more apparent.  We took a quick driving tour through the town.  There was a scenic drive - Pikes Peak toll road, which had incredibly windy turns through the mountain.  Unfortunately the road leading to it was closed, due to debris in the road.  At this point we were getting pretty exhausted, so back on the road we were. 

Only an hour up to Denver.  Such a relief to finally be somewhere we can settle down for a bit.  Denver is amazing, by the way.  We stayed downtown, in the financial district.

After cleaning up, we went out to explore, with what little time in the day we had left.

The streets down here were mostly empty, as far as cars at least.  Just a block up from our hotel was the 16th street mall.  Very beautiful.  About a mile and change long, every block had restaurants and bars, almost all of which were either open-air, or had a large outdoor space.  The weather in Denver, at least now, is just gorgeous, so everyone seems to want to take advantage of being outside as much as possible. 

The street has a free shuttle bus that runs up and down pretty much all day.  It stopped on every corner.  We took it to the end, where there is a walkway over light rail tracks, through a park which was occupied by people, couples, etc, as late as 10 PM, and over a pedestrian bridge crossing the freeway.  

Made it to the Ale House at Amato's.  Great experience.  Super friendly people there, although so far everyone in Denver has been friendly.  We got some Colorado brews, and sat at a table with a fire pit center.  The skyline was beautiful at night.

Tuesday, July 2nd.  Woke up to a beautiful day in Denver, as seen here from our hotel:

Today we are off to Golden Colorado, to see breweries, and then explore some neighboring places.  We are staying here another night, as we're ahead of schedule, and it's just too nice here not to.