Harley Davidson and Independence, MO (Tuesday)

A little cooler this morning (48), and some fog sitting on the water.  It's usually been in the 50s when I got up.  We picked up Ray and Linda and headed back to the Harley Davidson factory and took the factory tour.  Their more in-depth tour, the Steel Toe tour, was not available this week -- that part of the plant is closed for maintenance or something. They started making Harleys in 1903, and made 3 bikes the first year. An interesting note is that they let any employee owning a Harley park it right up front, so it's almost like more displays.  After you work for Harley for a year, you are eligible for a 20% employee discount.  We picked out the orange one for John from among the employee's bikes.

Pictures, of course, were not allowed inside the plant.  We were furnished with safety glasses, a radio, and a name tag.  After the tour, we walked through the displays and gift shop, then were on our way.

From here we headed over to historical Independence, Missouri.  We were back and forth across the Missouri River several times on every trip, so we never knew whether we were in Kansas or Missouri.  Independence is famous for the James brothers and for the home of President Harry Truman.  First we toured the Jackson County Marshall's House and Jail Museum.  We all thought these jail cells might be more of a deterrent to a life of crime than what we offer today.

After Jesse James was murdered in 1882, Frank James, fearing assassination, began negotiations with the Missouri Governor to surrender.   He was brought to this jail to await trial (he was found "not guilty") but while he was here in jail he was treated almost like a celebrity, and his cell almost looked like a home, with a bed, other furniture and pictures on the wall, and lots of visitors.

The Marshall's house was typical of the time.

There was also a school right here, and desks unlike we had ever seen.

When we came out of the jail, a mule-drawn wagon was parked at the curb, and the driver, dressed as an Amish man, offered to take us for a ride, but we passed on that.

We next went over to the Truman House for the 2:30 tour.  No pictures were allowed inside this house either, but the tour was very good.  The house was much more ordinary that we expected, and had been left as much as possible as it was when the Trumans lived there.

We only got to see about 5 rooms on the first floor, and none on the second floor.  We saw a model of the house at the Presidential Library that we went to next, and we could tell that we only saw a small portion of the house.

We were beginning to wear down, but went on over the Truman's Presidential Library.  This was a very interesting library, not fancy but full of the history of his presidency, and the decisions he made while in office (dropping the bombs on Japan, the Truman Doctrine).  This museum really traces the remarkable story of the man who became our 33rd president.  Both President and Mrs. Truman are buried on the grounds.  We missed the big celebration here by one day -- tomorrow (May 8) is his birthday and they are having a big party here.  The museum is divided into 5 sections:  Family, The Early Years, Political Career, Life in the White House, and Mr. Citizen."  The tour starts with a 10-minute video at the Truman Home Ticket Center which was next door to the jail we visited.  But it was all very interesting.

We didn't take many pictures (too tired) but Joe did get a couple of photos of cars, one he owned and one that was used when he was in office.  After he left office, he used the office here to work out of.  And there is a nice replication of the oval office while he served in Washington.

There was one other item in town we intended to visit but we could hardly walk by now, so we settled for a picture of the Community of Christ Temple.  Spiraling 300 feet into the air, this facility houses a museum, two theaters, a bookstore, a 1,600-seat sanctuary, multi-cultural artwork and a 102-rank Casavant Freses pipe organ.  We'll have to take them at their word for all that because we did not go in.

We headed back toward camp, stopped for dinner at the same restaurant we ate at last night (as well as breakfast this morning), and rested briefly before we resumed our card war.  Linda and I eked out a win for the first game, but for some crazy reason we decided to play a second game, and the guys whomped us again (they surely cheated). 

For some reason, we have both lost our sense of direction the whole time we've been around Kansas City -- must have something to do with crossing the river so many times.  Poor Ray has had to co-pilot everywhere we went.

We only saw one deer here, a few turkeys, ducks, geese, and lots and lots of pretty birds.  Lilacs are blooming around here, including a bush at the Truman House, but I did not think they would allow me to walk over there and break off a bloom, so I left that bush intact.  We never did have time to drive around this beautiful lake, so that's something left for another visit if we ever make it back here.  We really enjoyed our 4 days here, and had a great time with our new friends, Ray and Linda.

Steamboat Arabia/City Market/Hallmark/K C Racetrack (Monday)

We had a busy day today!  And an excellent one.  Ray and Linda had a vet appointment first thing so we didn't get an early start, but we sure had a full day.  Our first stop was the Steamboat Arabia Museum, an absolutely fascinating place!   How fun this whole project must have been, and it is ongoing because there is still nearly a third of the cargo to finish cleaning, preserving, and then exhibiting.  This steamboat used 32 cords of wood every 24 hours to keep the boilers going, so they often used chopped down trees along the river bank to restock their wood supply.  Logs and stumps often ended up in the river as the soil eroded.  The Missouri River in those days was very treacherous because of that.  They call this river the "Might Mo," too thick to drink, too thin to plow.

"In the year 1856, the steamboat Arabia served as a lifeline to the frontier, bringing tons of new supplies westward to settlements along the Missouri River.  The 171-foot long steamboat, with her twin stacks belching clouds of smoke and ash, pulled away from port en route to towns on the western frontier.  On her deck and nestled in the cargo hold below lay over 200 tons of brand new merchandise:  European dishware, jewelry, guns, tools, food products, and clothing items, shoes and boots were included among her cargo.  The big side-wheeler had just left Kansas City when her hull was suddenly pierced by a submerged tree, which acted like a torpedo.  She sank in about 5 minutes with all of her treasures lost."

All the crew and passengers, however, survived because they were able to reach the top deck of the boat which stayed above water.  The only casualty was a mule.

"Years after the tragic accident, the river changed course, and the legendary Arabia and its hoard of buried treasure was discovered beneath a Kansas farm field.  Buried for 132 years, this steamboat, her evacuation in 1988 uncovered a "time capsule" of remarkably preserved 1856 frontier supplies -- the world's largest collection."

"Lying 45 feet underground, one-half mile from the river's edge, the legendary Arabia had at last been found.  Men and machines soon returned to the spot and unearthed what would become the discovery of a lifetime."
We took tons of pictures here but I will try to limit this to just a few.  The cargo they have found has been cleaned, preserved, and is wonderfully displayed.  Most of the artifacts were in excellent condition because they were still in the shipping crates.

Of particular interest was an exhibit of "bed keys."  We asked what they were for and learned that they actually were used to tighten the rope beds on the boat.  That's where the saying, "good night, sleep tight," came from.

There was a really nice book in the Gift Shop that told the story of this discovery, and had some pictures of the cargo on display.  But they have added so many more exhibits of cargo since the book was published in 1995 that I decided not to buy it.  Instead, I told the cashier (who happened to be the wife/mother of the some of the treasure hunters) that they needed to publish a new book, to which she said, "that is a great idea."

There was a short video about the history of this discovery, and at the end of the film one of the original team talked to us (he was the husband of the cashier, a truly family operation.  Our tour guide was a distant cousin.)

We finally left here, grabbed lunch at a diner just across the street, then walked over to the City Market.  Since this was Monday, there were few vendors there today, but we did go into a spice shop, and bought some fresh fruit and vegetables from the few vendors there.

Next, we headed to the Hallmark Visitors Center.  We thought they actually did factory tours but it was more like a museum, with displays of lots of cards, Christmas ornaments,Keepsake ornaments, Christmas trees, and a listing of the Hallmark movies.  There was a press, and we were told they usually did demonstrations but the operator had a job to do "down the street" today.  It was a nice place, and they gave us some gifts, including a thank you card for both of our veterans, and a little bow we made ourselves at the bow machine.

I even shook hands with our wise friend, Maxine.

We had a hard time finding this place (it's in the Crown Center area), more difficulty finding the right building, and even more difficulty finding our car when we were done.  That became the "excellent adventure" of the day.  Joe finally had to resort to hitting the panic button because we weren't on the right floor of the parking garage.  Who knew that button would work through the concrete floor!  It took us three hits on the panic button, but finally we found the Explorer.

We were headed to the Harley Davidson factory but saw in their brochure that the free tours ended at 1:30 (it's 3:30 by now), so we will try to do that tomorrow.  Instead we headed to the Kansas City Speedway, which was also closed.  But we did talk to the gate attendant, and she advised us to drive next door to the top level of the parking garage at the Hollywood Casino for a better look.  So that's what we did.

Our pilot and co-pilot--and we needed both of them today.
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And we didn't even lose our car here!

There was a baseball stadium next door, which Ray thought was where the KC Royals play.  Cabellos was also right here.

Linda suggested we stop for pie on the way home at a little restaurant they like, but when we got there we decided to have a light dinner instead, and bought a whole pie to take home with us.

We saw today that the sun actually does shine here in the sunshine state of Kansas, although the news said they had only had 5 completely sunny days during the last 36 days.  It was cloudy all morning, but we were really happy to have the sunshine at our beautiful campsite.

A perfect ending to a perfect day -- we had our pie on the picnic table, then played cards with our new friends.  We had a lot of laughs today.  But the guys beat us soundly, so tomorrow night it's Game On for me and Linda.

And we got to watch a stunning sunset over Smithville Lake.