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Kansas
Travel Blog
Chronicling
changes to KansasTravel.org and Keith's exploration
& photographing Kansas restaurants, attractions, museums, festivals
and art. Contact him.
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| Monday
- December 1, 2014: This was another night of extensive scouting of
Christmas displays in Overland Park (I went out checking, at least briefly,
every night for about 10 days.) One of the pleasant surprises was how much
the "Holiday Lights at the Farmstead" ar Deanna
Rose Children's Farmstead had improved in its second year.
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Holiday Lights at the Farmstead |
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| Tuesday
- December 2, 2014: Back out checking Christmas displays in Leawood,
we stopped for supper at Imo's Pizza in Overland Park. This 135th Street
location is the only Kansas location for the St. Louis pizza chain. It
had been about a year since we had been to this restaurant, which is included
in our Overland Park Restaurant Guide.
We
went on south to Edgerton where Kenny Pritchard had invited us to see his
"Candy Cane Lane." There were no lights on and the many inflatable fixtures
were not running. We called Kenny's number, but there was just an answering
machine. After leaving voice mail, we headed back out of town, but had
a call back from Kenny just after leaving town, and after waiting for a
train, returned to his home, where he was starting the 20 minute task of
turning on the large display. Candy Cane Lane has about 125 Christmas inflatables
and over 200 other items & lights. They fill the Pritchards' yard and
their neighbor's yard and visitors are invited to walk to the back yards
to see the rest of the Christmas display. A new page devoted to Edgerton
Candy Cane Lane has been added.
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Candy Cane Lane
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| Thursday
- December 4, 2014: Tonight we drove to Lawrence to check out the displays
in the Lawrence Christmas
Light Tour. As an experiment, we drove the route in the opposite direction
from previous years and it worked enough better that the route has now
been reversed. We already knew that some displays had not gone back up
for 2014, but we had to remove only one other displays from the tour and
were able to return one other display which had dropped off in 2013. The
display in the photo to the right is Howe Family Christmas Animated Light
Display in south Lawrence.
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Howe Family Christmas Light Display |
| Friday
- December 5, 2014: This evening, I dined at Fritz's
Chili in Overland Park, which began 41 years ago as a Dixon's Chili
parlor. Although Fritz's has a loyal following, it isn't listed here as
much for the food, as for the tradition and atmosphere. The fixtures date
from the restaurant's opening.
Other
than an increase in some prices, Fritz's is little changed since our last
visit, three years ago.
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| Saturday
- December 6, 2014: Linda joined me for lunch and we returned to within
a block of Fritz's Chili as I update the Overland
Park Restaurant Reviews. Burg
and Barrel is a 2 year old gourmet burger bar, which moved into a former
location of The Peanut.
There
were a few changes since our last visit, notably, most items have gone
up $1 in price and the three booths which were the only seating that wasn't
on tall stools have been removed.
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| Sunday
- December 7, 2014:
Linda and Mary joined me in driving to Topeka, where we were joined by
Lyle Wilson and visited all the Christmas displays from the 2013 Topeka
Christmas Light Tour. Only one display had to be removed from the previous
years tour. The most interesting new display, was one of the homes in Potwin
Place (see photo at right).
Before
the tour, we revisited Speck's
Bar and Grill which has been on our list of Unique
Kansas Restaurants since 2005. I thoroughly enjoyed their grilled half
pound bomber dog smothered in Swiss cheese, jalapeno peppers, sauerkraut
and onions.
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Potwin Place
Bomber Dog
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| Friday
- December 12, 2014: I was on my own for another evening of checking
out new displays for the
Kansas
City Christmas Light Tour. I found displays worth adding to the tour
in both Gardner and De Soto. The one at the right is on the south side
of Gardner. |
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| Saturday
- December 12, 2014: Since we were already going to Kansas City, Missouri
to see a University of Kansas Jayhawk's basketball game, it seemed like
a good time to check out the new Char Bar, a BBQ restaurant in the Westport
neighborhood.
The
four of us tried the $44 Whomp Platter, which is a sampling of all 6 sliced
meats, burnt ends, half slab,
bucket
of fries, jar o' pickles & two junior nice fixin's. My favorite dish
was our appetizer - the lobster deviled eggs.
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Whomp Platter |
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| Friday
- December 19, 2014: Yesterday's special at the Downtown
Diner in Olathe was a Sheboygan burger (burger, Swiss cheese, Italian
sausage, grilled onions, sauerkraut). It sounded fabulous, but I didn't
see it on Facebook until after lunch. When I commented on that, the owner
offered to male the same sandwich today.
It
was even better than it sounds. Rich and Sue Caines are working on a new
menu
and this sandwich may be one of the 4 or 5 new burgers to go on the new
menu.
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Sheboygan burger |
| Saturday
- December 21, 2014: I added a new page for one of Kansas' unique attractions,
the They Also Ran Gallery in Norton,
Kansas, which we visited in July. It is devoted to Presidential Candidates
who were defeated, and it has received a lot of attention from around the
country.
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| Sunday
- December 22, 2014: We have another new page, devoted to the Missouri
Pacific Railroad Depot in Waterville, Kansas. The Waterville Railroad
Depot was built in 1870 and moved to its present location in 1982. The
modest museum does not maintain regular hours, but volunteers are happy
to schedule an appointment to show you through the museum.
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| Monday
- December 23, 2014: At lunch, I visited Olathe's newest restaurant,
Sher-E-Punjab, which just opened on Friday. It is the first Indian restaurant
in Olathe and has been opened by the owner of Maharaja in Blue Springs,
Missouri. They have a lunch buffet Tuesday - Sunday.
I
thought the food was a little bland, but it is a little soon to be making
a judgment about this new restaurant.
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Sher-E-Punjab |
| Friday
- December 26, 2014: Today's lunch was at a second new Olathe restaurant,
just 3 or 4 doors from the one where I dined on Monday. It is a 5 week
old BBQ restaurant, Despite what it says on the sign, the name is actually
Jonathan's Gourmet Wood-Fire Grill.
The
burnt ends were tender cubes which tasted like roast beef. I didn't notice
flavor from the smoking or rub. The sauce was dark, thin and had tiny pieces
of some vegetable or spice in it. The chef wouldn't say what was in the
sauce, but I think there was some cocoa. The chef said he has 25 sauces,
but this is the one for the holiday season.
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Jonathan's Gourmet Wood-Fire Grill |
| Monday
- December 29, 2014: Now that it has been open several month, we made
a third visit to Fireside BBQ in Overland Park. They had added several
items and I wanted to try them, particularly the burnt end chili and the
French fries. The chili wasn't a stand out, but was fairly good, if a little
too bean heavy. The fries appeared to have been baked, rather than fried,
and were disappointing.
One
big improvement was that the meats were all warmer than they were in October.
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Fireside BBQ |
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