February 13 : Strataca - Salt Mine Tour

 As we prepare to depart the great state of Kansas we want to get in all the things we had wanted to do. There are these salt mines about 45 minutes outside of the city (In Hutchinson, Kansas) We hadn't been able to go at the start of our Kansas living because children have to be four or older to go underground. Thomas has been four, for half a year so we were well in the time frame. 

We bought our tickets for Sunday afternoon. Left church a tad early to go home, let Harpo out, then make it there in time for our reservation. 

There was a little museum area while we waited to go in. I really knew nothing about this until going there. Crazy how far DOWN you go into the earth! It was super fun!

We made our way into this little room with everyone else in our 1:00 time slot. We watched a video talking about safety in the salt mine, then got our hard hats on and ready to board the holt (fancy word for elevator) Masks were only required in the holt since we were all packed into a little space. 

When we got down to the space it was a big OPEN space, not like a cave you think of. The walls, ceiling floor was all salt. 

 

At this point we were just allowed to explore the large museum. Our tickets included a train ride and a dark tour. After learning so many cool things about salt and the mine we made our way toward the train ride. BTW all this salt is salt used for roads (obviously not Kansas given the week before last, haha)

The train ride took us through the mine, stopping along the way at six different spots to teach us about what it used to be like down there when this area was a working mine. It currently is a working mine, but not where this museum is. The mine would look like a waffle from up above because of the columns holding up the ceiling. 

This is an area that had the ceiling collapse 

Back in the 50s when they worked the mine they never took their trash with them. It was more expensive to take it with than to leave it. So now, for this museum it was like a time capsule. So much trash that all shares a story of history. 

Even a toilet. 

After the train, we got on a tram and did another tour in a different part of the mine. 

This one taught us more about the salt structure itself. 

Once things come down to the mine they don't leave. Here's a super old tractor. 

Then we got to take a pit stop and collect a salt rock as a souvenir 

After the rides we finished up the museum part where we learned about all the things from Holly wood stored here in the mine (in another area of course) but since it's temperature controlled they keep lots of things down here. 

It was a super cool experience and we all learned so much! Highly recommend if you're ever in Kansas! 

Nov 26-27, 2021 - West Kansas Road Trip

 So happy to be over our quarantine we took a quick weekend trip out west. We have been wanting to see the state park called Little Jerusalem Bad Lands, it was four and a half hours so we decided to break up the trip and stay overnight in Hays, KS. There was a Natural History museum there that we could get into with our Exploration Place membership. We dropped Harpo off at the boarding resort Friday morning (day after Thanksgiving after I subbed a 8:30am cycle class) then headed out west. We stopped for lunch in Salina, Kansas (an hour and a half away) enjoyed some good barbecue. As you can imagine the scenery the whole drive, lol. Yup FLAT FLAT FLAT!

Hays is about 2 and a half hours from us and we first went to the museum. It was fairly small which was expected but it was a lot better than I imagined. We started with learning about Charles Sternberg himself and his fossils finding adventures.

We got to see the awesome Fish within a fish fossil: 

lots of rocks and science stuff. Kyle's favorite as he remembered his geology background. 

They had ice age stuffed animals and a kid area with some hands on activities. 

The upstairs area took you back 65 million years ago when Kansas was at the bottom of the ocean in the big diorama room. 

Made our way around and found more hands on activities and a whole discovery room we spent a good amount of time in.

 

Final stop in the museum was the snake area. They had live snakes and so much info about them. Kids took their turn seeing how their height matched up to various species of snakes. 

  

Time to leave and head to our hotel for the night, they had a pool so the kids got some swimming in. 

The next morning I think the kids took a little swim again after our hot breakfast then we got on the road further west. We took a little detour off our direct path to visit this Buffalo Bill statue in Oakley, KS (an hour and fifteen minutes from where we stayed in Hays)

The we drove another half hour straight south to find Monument rocks in the middle of no where! Literally, we had to drive down dirt roads through private property to get to these rocks, but they were super cool. 

When I uploaded all these photos for my blog they all came up in REVERSE order!!! ARG I've been trying to move them around to the correct order from how we experienced them but I'm not going to for the rest of these until we head to the next location. 

There were these crazy little nests we noticed (which we learn about at our next stop - I got a photo below about it)

We pulled up to two different areas to get out and walk around. 

Then we drove about a half hour away to the badlands state park. On our way we noticed this massive thing bopping along in the field. We stopped to watch and it was a HUGE mule deer! 

We watched it for a while then it turned to cross the street right in front of us and we got a great look at it!

As we neared the state park entrance we noticed these rock formations:

Then finally made it, since this was the purpose of our trip and at first glance already glad we went to see monument rock (worth the drive IMO, this place not quite as much) we wanted to milk it for all it was worth which meant walking every step of the hiking trail. Thankfully there was a bathroom so we all got to hit that. Then set off on the gorgeous sunny day. 

 

So unlike monument rock where they stuck UP from the ground, these were more like canyons IN the group, so we are up on a hill and the trails goes near the edge - it didn't take us down into the valleys. 

And here's where I stop recording them because if I do every picture it's literally going to take me a year to finish this darn blog, LOL. So these were from the end of our hike...

Mary LOVED the hike, can't you tell :-P

Approaching the look out area you see above. 

And here's the info about those other nests we saw on the rocks across the road. 

We made it back to the car and set off for the long four hour drive home that evening. Saw some more deer through the field as we left. Not as big as the mule deer, pretty far away. 

We got to enjoy the beautiful sunset behind us. 

Kids fell asleep on the way. It was a fun adventure and glad we got to learn about Kansas in a whole new way from what's in eastern Kansas.