We arose this morning late, almost 8:00 am. Yesterday was a long day. We packed and got out of the room by 9:30 am. We did not eat any breakfast. We started to explore Manhattan. The first task was to find the campus. The "downtown" are has changed so much. Our first try ended us on the road to Fort Riley. We finally found it. Once we found the campus, we were able to navigate to Jardine Terrace, the married students apartments where we spent four years. Many of the 50's vintage buildings have been replaced with new buildings. BUT our building (W) was still there. Below is our building with our apartment being on the second floor, third from the right.
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| "W" Jardine Terrace |
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| Many of the old apartments have been replaced with these |
Next was to find T's old dairy hall and dairy bar.
Did they still make the same ice cream soda as they did 40 years ago???
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| Yes, it was excellent! |
We parked the car at the Student Union and proceeded to walk onto the campus. We were studying a map in the courtyard when a very pretty young coed came up and asked if she could help us find something. I was speechless, but T thanked her and explained we were just reacquainting ourselves after a 40 year absence. She welcomed us back and went on her way. I was still speechless!
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| Seaton Hall Engineering Building |
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| New construction all over the campus |
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| "New" 1996 entry to the Library |
We journeyed to Caldwell Hall. In the basement was the computing section where both of us spent many a long day (and night) typing on key punch machines and feeding punch card decks to the computer.
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| This was the door where you submitted your decks and picked up your results. |
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| Ahearn Field House (where they played basketball) |
We departed KSU around noon and spent the next six uneventful hours driving to St. Louis without stop. Not having had any breakfast or lunch, we decided to stop at the Three Flags tavern (just a few blocks from home) and have oysters and steak for dinner. We got home about 7:30 pm. The house is in good shape, but there is a lot of yard work to do.
So ends our Summer 2016 Western Trip. We traveled a total of 5,950 miles over 23 days. The main deviation from our original route was "dropping" by Arches National Park between Mesa Verde and Greeley, CO. The final route looked something like this:
Our next trip will take place during the week of September 19. We will be going just down the road (140 miles) to the Montauk State Park for a little fly fishing. We have a cabin booked for four nights.
