Westward Ho! The Adventure Continues: across TN, KY, IL, MO and KS

 Day 4 was a rather long and dull driving day.  We traversed the remainder of Tennessee, from Nashville we cut northwest across a corner of Kentucky, entered Illinois and crossed the Mississippi River at St. Louis.  We landed at Hickory Ridge Campground in Montgomery City MO after driving 452 miles, a rather long driving day.

Site #73 at Hickory Ridge Campground

The next morning we continued the long trek across I-70 through Missouri and Kansas.  

Passing Kauffman Stadium, home to the Kansas City Royals

After 4 days and about 1200 miles I finally coerced Dorcas into taking a turn behind the wheel.

Don't she look good piloting the big rig?

Our route so far

After a modest driving day of 318 miles, we stopped for the night at Covered Wagon Campground in Abilene KS.  Abilene is famous for being the boyhood home and final resting place of President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Site #53 at Covered Wagon Campground

This evening we explored Abilene.  Besides the Eisenhower connection, Abilene is known for its murals. 

And it is also known for its colorfully painted cowboy boots scattered about town.

Dorcas modeling the world's largest belt buckle

We learned of a jazz band concert happening at a local park this evening.  These concerts only occur here once per month, so we were fortunate to be present on this night.  The musicians were very talented and consisted primarily of local high school and college music teachers from the area.  Before the concert I was able to talk to the drummer and reminisced about when I played in the stage band in high school.  They actually played several tunes we played way back then.

Lick HERE to view a short video montage of the concert.

We find some awfully nice things when we are actually able to get off the interstate and stop for a while!  We should try to do it more often!

We are running a little ahead of schedule, so we plan to learn some more about Ike tomorrow morning.