Somewhere Over the Rainbow...

We said good-bye to Colorado some time in the morning.  I don't exactly know when, as nobody was really paying attention enough to notice when we crossed into Kansas.  It's not like the mountains stop at the state line, and the prairies start (wouldn't that be cool if it did though?).  It had been pretty flat since Denver, and just kept getting flatter (if that's even possible).  What stark contrast to our week in the mountains!

Hard to see, but it was a double rainbow!

We pulled into Hayes, Kansas at what should have been 12:30, but Clare reminded us all it was actually 1:30 as we were now in Central Time.  Man, that sucks!  It worked to our advantage on the drive to Utah, but not so much on the way home.  Oh well, it didn't stop us from our visit to yet another museum (science center affiliate).

Sternberg Museum of Natural History was actually more interesting than any of us expected.  We knew it was small going in, and had estimated about 2 hours to see it.  We were done in about 1.5, but that's not because it wasn't good.  It was just small.  What drew us to this small museum, besides a chance to stretch our legs?  The rattlesnake display, of course!  Yes, Robin picked this one!

We checked out the rattlesnake exhibit first, naturally, and I'm proud to say that even Robin learned things!  I had no idea there were so many different types of rattlesnakes in North America, and they had live exhibits of every one.  It was pretty cool.

We left that area, and heard a weird grunting sound.  Robin got a big smile on her face, and led us over to an enclosed area with Spur Thigh Tortoises, one on top of the other.  A family near by were enjoying the show as the parents explained wrestling tortoises to the kids.  Weird kind of wrestling if you ask me.  Robin got pictures of it too, but Clare refuses to post any of THOSE pictures.  All I got is this one for you all.  Sorry folks.

We then made our way into the fossil area, where we learned that Kansas dinosaurs are mostly aquatic, as this land was all underwater at that time.  We saw giant sharks, and the fossils of a large fish, with a smaller fish inside (so it died shortly after eating the fish, if I've understood all this fossil stuff the last few weeks).  This display lead us up a circular ramp to the "diorama room" that was prefaced with this sign:

When we entered the room, Robin's first comment was "diorama is a bit of an understatement here" and I have to agree.  It was an amazing circular room with a dome ceiling, and life size dinosaurs, some of which were animated!  The T-Rex was a little too lifelike for my tastes, thank you very much.   

We all agreed it was well worth the stop.

Another hour or so down the road, and we came to our home for the night in the Salina KOA, although this time we upgraded to a Deluxe Cabin (all the regular cabins were taken).  We are back into temperatures in the 90s (it was 99 at the museum) AND the humidity is back.  Anyways, Clare asked for an upgrade from a tent site, and they took what they could get.  Now she's fallen in love with the deluxe cabin (instead of a room with a bed and A/C, we have our own bathroom, kitchenette, tv and everything).  Yup, might just have converted us all on this one :)

Whatever!