Kansas City......

I headed out of St Louis around 4 pm on my way to Kansas City...not a bad drive only about 5 hours as the Turtle flies...listened to my audiobook to help pass the time. "A Tale of Two Cities" it's not bad after you get use to the vernacular. Settled in for the night at a rest stop 40 miles east of town. Tuesday morning I was going to head straight into town to see a few sights and figured I would go to the campground later in the afternoon, but the weather was turning really nasty with no sign of letting up so I went directly to the campground settled in and decided to hang there for the night and work on this blog and some photos...the campground was OK for $17 a day...hot showers and electricity.

Wednesday.......woke up to a chamber of commerce day 65 and sunny. The plan for the day was to start the day at The Country Club Plaza which was billed as this great tourist spot...I know I should learn my lesson on this shopping malls billed as tourist attractions...it turned out to be just a high end shopping district with some fancy fountains....pass. Next on the agenda was a couple of museums the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art and the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art......The Nelson sounded interesting because of these huge shuttlecocks (see pic above) in the lawn and the sculpture garden surrounding it and I was not disappointed at all. They had the aforementioned shuttlecocks and several Henry Moore pieces....it was a pleasant day and besides Major and I needed to walk at little after being couped up in the van for a whole day. Check out the slide show to see more of the art....on to the Kemper it also had several pieces of sculpture on the grounds....one thing I can say about KC it has lots of fountains and public art.....inside there were major exhibits one was some travel photos from a guy name Stephen Shore...never heard of him but is supposedly some big shot in the photography world....the exhibit was junk...looked like a bunch of tourist pics from the 70's...one picture was of his breakfast at some greasy spoon, pancakes and all....I would show you guys what I mean but the did not allow photos....next up was some modern paintings from various artist.
Most of them were pretty good but one piece looks like it was done by a 4 year old (see slide show)...don't get me wrong I like modern art and I know that art is in the eye of the beholder...but really, you have to be kidding (again admission was free and you get what you pay for)...I will let you guys judge for yourself. Enough culture I need to get some souvenirs and lunch....Union Station is the second largest train station in the US....Grand Central in NY is the biggest. See pics....not much else to say about that stop. Now for lunch. When in KC you must eat BBQ and Arthur Bryant's is the best...well I was not disappointed.....it had all the making of the perfect
restaurant....off the beaten path, simple decor and furnishings, filled with locals, and cooks with an attitude. It reminded me of a cross between the Varsity and the Double D. The sandwich was $8 (sliced beef on loafabread) and it had $8 dollars worth of meat on it (see slide show)....the sauce was different than either Uncle D's or the Carolina style that I am used to. They had two kinds the President's choice ( evidently Jimmy Carter's Favorite) and the Sweet Heet....you know I went for the sweet heet and man did it live up to it name.....that was some of the best beef I have ever had (except Uncle's State Championship Brisket)....That sandwich alone made the stop in KC worth the trip.......fat and happy I went back to the campground for the night to get some sleep..............overslept Thursday morning and had to hustle to make it to the Harley Plant for the tour....well turns out the tour center was closed for remodeling...Hey but I got this great shot of the front.......next stop Boulder CO

Later..............
Brett