I believe that certain places give you energy, others take energy from you, and everyone’s energy map is different. Hopefully, if you are lucky, your energy map will align with your partner. Sam and I do not always align with the places that give us energy, but so far, we have aligned with the ones that drain us. I am sorry to say, but Branson, Missouri is not our spot.
Everything seemed harder while we were there. While we will not be repeat customers, I’d like to think I could find a silver lining or something I enjoyed out of every experience. On each of my location change posts, I am going to share my fave and not fave things about the spot we just left.
Fave
- Table Rock Lake
- Billy Gail’s Restaurant
- Leftovers go a long way
- Views Along Highway
Not Fave
- Cigarette Smoke Indoors
- Ticket Sales People Pitching Timeshares
- Lack of Vegetables
- Grocery Stores
On our way out of Branson, we remembered we forgot to buy a postcard. Sam and I are buying a postcard from each location we visit and writing down our favorite memories on the back. When we finish this trip, we will put together a book of our memories to always have to look back on. We will also have my blog posts.
As we were driving, we saw signs for “Ozarkland” that advertised selling souvenirs and travel items. We assumed there had to be a postcard there and we were right. It is odd, but makes sense, that you cannot buy a postcard online. I checked and they only have vintage options that are expensive. We need to get better at remembering to buy one!
Driving into Kansas
Every area in the US has their stereotypes. While it is impossible to categorize an entire region into certain classifications, there are some spots within the region that the stereotype was based off of. For me, since Kansas is as middle of the country as you could get, I assumed (my b) that the stereotypes came from there and expanded outwards.
Well, I was wrong. We drove through areas that were certainly rural. At lunch time, I started to get nervous that I would have to eat snacks until we arrived in Wichita. Out of the blue, a Sonic popped up and we have never been happier. We had been driving, hungry, for at least a half hour before there was a sign of food. Also, google maps somehow did not capture the Sonic on the app.
Most of the rural land we drove past had a beauty to it. A lot of the property had horses and cattle. I enjoyed seeing them as we drove by. If you have ever played “Settlers of Catan”, there were moments that looked like the “Wheat” tiles. The yellow was vibrant and the hills were rolling. Not like anything we had expected.
Actually, this is the new slogan of our experience in Wichita: Not What We Expected.
Challenge
Find the beauty where the world says it does not exist. People always say that the Midwest is full of rural land, but to someone who did not grow up surrounded by it, it was quite amazing to see firsthand.