Trip To Kansas City

living.boondockingmexico@yahoo.com

(Barbara Lane posted about Winstead's a famous drive up restaurant that has survived decades.  Barbara, I just want you to know I saw your comment after posting the blog and want to tell you I had breakfast there!  Great as always!)

Visits home come with baggage.  Lots of memories both good and bad.  This trip will probably be the last one for quite some time.  It was fun and there is nothing like seeing family.  That said, Kansas City has nothing to offer me anymore.  I guess 40 years and the passing of time takes its toll.   My little brother still lives there and a sister leaves about two hours away.  Out of ten kids most are spread around the U.S. and getting them together is a real chore and one that no one seems to want to tackle anymore.  

My brother and his wife from Hawaii came into town for a few weeks.  They'll be visiting friends, family and also taking a side trip to Winnipeg.   My cousin Marian lives in Winnipeg and will be moving to Massachusetts just before winter sets in.   We went out for dinner along with a long-time family friend.   I was able to visit with my brother and his wife several times.  They stayed at the hotel next door.  

My oldest nephew and his wife are die hard Royals fans.   She's a head nurse and he is a teacher at the University of Missouri.  There son is 14 and a freshman in high school.  He's into robotics and loves his video game.  In the picture below you can see from l to r my godson from Germany, my little brother, nephew, his mother and yours truly!  They like Mexican food and wanted to take me to an authentic Mexican restaurant.  Well, it was Mexican, but it was more like TexMex.  Very good food no doubt.  I loved the enchiladas.  

Seeing family was fun and I'm glad I had the opportunity to make a stop off after my course from Pennsylvania.  Part of the trip was paid for and made it easier to stay for more than a couple of days.  I had a nice hotel on the Country Club Plaza although it has become very expensive.   This is an excerpt from the history of the Plaza:

The Country Club Plaza (often referred to as The Plaza) is a privately owned American shopping center in the Country Club District of Kansas City, Missouri.

The center consists of 18 separate buildings representing 804,000 square feet of retail space and 468,000 square feet of office space.^[1] The standalone buildings are built in a distinctive Seville Spain theme and are on different blocks mostly west of Main Street and mostly north of Brush Creek and blends into the Country Club neighborhood around it and the whole area is often simply called the "The Plaza."

It was the first shopping center in the world designed to accommodate shoppers arriving by automobile.

We live a few blocks from here and I spent many a summer hanging out, walking around, rebel rousing and having a coke and a smoke.  It has changed quite a bit but for the better.  It is much more of an upper-class shopping area than it was back in the day.  The surrounding apartment towers are now tony condos for the up and coming in the city.  Breakfast and lunch out and evenings at cocktail bars are all the in thing there now. 

One thing that isn't mentioned in the above about is that the Kansas City and the Plaza are known as the city of fountains.  Here are just a few.  Funny that they are mostly nudes for a place built in the 20s and in the Midwest to boot.  

I guess it would be a great place to spend a few days but it just seems like the city is empty.  No one on the streets and people certainly don't do much walking.  My little brother and I went downtown to the city market which like everything else has turned into a posh place to eat and buy produce.   The Steamboat Arabia is also housed down by the river.  The steamboat sank in the Missouri river in the mid 1800s and was found 30 years ago buried in a cornfield as the river had shifted its course over the years.  Arabia was a cargo ship and was loaded with goods.  They were amazingly preserved and a museum was open which as I said houses the remains of the ship as well as store fronts that stock all of the products, clothing, jarred foods, hardware and more.   It's truly like walking back in time.

Well, my time came to an end on Tuesday as I had rental car with a weekend price.  I think I mentioned the fact that the four-day weekend was at $9 a day but had I kept the car until then next day the total would have come to $350.  I found an economy hotel a mile from the airport with shuttle service.  I dropped off the car in the late afternoon, they picked me up and took me to the hotel.  The next morning bright and early at 4 a.m. they took me back to catch my flight.  I hope it's true that TSA may be replaced by something else.  What a waste of energy and time.  The took my bag for inspection but piddled around for 15 minutes before inspecting it.  I made it to the plane (less than 30 meters away) before they closed the door.  They announced a 3 minute warning before closing the door and the TSA said, "well, that happens".  They didn't give a rat's behind.

I just had to post this pic of a Kansas City policeman on patrol at the airport.  God forbid there was an emergency, he'd never make it.  Too bad you can't see his front side.