prestyn's wine bar – The Adventures of Mike and Cindy

This was the third trip to our house in St. Joseph this year. This trip was two and a half months, and included a trip within a trip when we went to Louisville, Kentucky, with the Webers. This post covers our drive out and the first two weeks in July.

The Drive to Missouri

We now have the two day bonsai drive from California to Missouri down. This drive went rather smoothly, no incidents or weather events. We did try a new route through Kansas which was mostly two lane roads through some pretty small towns. There was no banjo music and all went well. This route saved us a little more than an hour on day 2. When we arrived on night 2, there was a really active thunderstorm to the north of us moving in our direction. We got in, unloaded, and were safely in our bed before the storm hit. How was that for some great timing for a change. Here is Thea relaxing on her bed in our hotel room in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

And yes, the dog has her head on a pillow. Don’t all dogs sleep on a bed with a pillow?

Two weeks in July

On our first full day in Missouri, we set up our back patio with the furniture we had purchased back in March and a few things we had brought on this trip. It looked pretty darn good.

That night, we met the Culvers at our favorite wine bar, Prestyn’s. It was “TV Themes” bingo night. You played it by listening to a 20 second clip from a TV show, and if you could guess the song you marked it on your bingo card, if it is there. I won a free one topping pizza during the round where you had to have two bingos on your card. Yea!! I have added a link to Prestyn’s website at the end of this post.

Because it was unusually hot and humid, even for the midwest, Cindy and I puttered around until Tuesday. Here is our outdoor thermometer showing the outside temperature at 5 pm at 92 degrees, with a real feel of 105 degrees because of the 59% humidity. Ouch.

On Tuesday, we picked up Corrianne at the Kansas City Airport. She flew in to spend a week with us and to attend the famous Culver Smokeout BBQ. She brought me a father’s day gift that was delicious.

The next day, the girls went to get pedicures while Scott and I went fishing at a few ponds on one of his cousins’ property. We caught 30 blue gill between the two of us, about 15 each. Some were bigger than others.

We returned home victorious, showered up and were off to Prestyn’s Wine bar to have some wine and watch Scott and Heather compete in their cornhole league. Here are Scott and Heather playing.

When a team failed to show up for their game, Corrianne and I were asked to stand in and we did. Quite poorly I hate to admit. But we still had fun. Here is Corrianne playing. Apparently I am not photogenetic because Cindy did no take any pictures of me playing.

We enjoyed the evening in spite of our terrible showing on the cornhole gridiron, or what ever it is called. We will get them next time.

A few days later, Cindy, Corrianne, and I went downtown and had lunch at RC’s Lunch Car. The place is only a year old and is a bit of a hole in the wall. There are a few tables inside with most of the seating around a horseshoe counter that surrounds the kitchen and prep area.

So why would one come to this little oddity? The food is outstanding. Corrianne and I ordered different sandwiches so we could share a half with each other. We had the hot Pastrami Reuben, which had house smoked pastrami, sauerkraut, special sauce, and swiss cheese on rye bread; and the Cubano, which had smoked pork, ham, swiss cheese, mustard and house made pickles on a ciabatta roll. Both were grilled panini style. And we had house made fries. I usually don’t include food pictures unless it is something really special. This met that criteria.

The food was a 10 out of 10. We will be back for more for sure. Since they do not have their own website yet, I’ve included a link that has some information about them and a menu at the end of this post. With full bellies, we visited a downtown antique store, then headed home for the night. We needed to rest up for the big BBQ at the Culver abode the next day.

On to the now infamous Culver Smokeout, where there is more smoked meat than you can imagine. This year’s selection included pulled pork, cupcake chicken (chicken cooked in cupcake shaped pans), brisket, chicken drumsticks, bacon wrapped chicken drumsticks, beef ribs, and pork ribs. And it was all delicious. Add to that all of the side dishes and deserts that all of the guests brought, and there was enough food to feed several small armies. Here the girls are working on the pulled pork. From left to right are Heather, Corrianne, and Cindy.

Here is one of my favorite sights. The Parade of Meats. Here are all of the meats coming in from the smokers. All of the meat made it in safely, or you would have seen several grown men cry.

It was time to dig in to a delicious feast. Great job Scott and Heather and helpers!!!

I already can’t wait for next year.

The next day Corrianne and I visited the Glore Psychiatric Museum. I have visited this museum twice already, but it is more than interesting enough to visit a third time. It chronicles not only the psychiatric hospital in St. Joseph, but the mental health treatment system throughout history and is quite interesting. Here is the outside of one of the buildings, an interesting mobile made out of pill bottles, and a disturbing life size sticker near one of the stairways.

Here is some patient art.

Here are a few general pictures from the museum.

There is a condition named “Pica.” Pica is a mental health condition where a person compulsively swallows non-food items. A patient at the St. Joseph facility was known to have this, so she was closely watched. Upon her untimely death, the below items were found in her stomach during the autopsy. I guess they failed at monitoring this patient.

Here is one of the creepier places in the museum. The actual morgue.

And on the way out, we were allowed to visit the very creepy hallway that contained art from some of the patients.

This museum is a must see when visiting the St. Joseph area. A link is at the end of this post.

The next day was Corrianne’s last full day with us so we made it a full and interesting one. We drove to Atchison, Kansas, about 45 minutes away from us and started our city tour with a visit to the Atchison Santa Fe Freight Depot Museum. Here are a few pictures from that stop.

This was more of a distraction since one of the two main reasons for our visit was next. Our next stop was at a very non-descript house in the middle of a neighborhood. Here we are in front of it.

So why would anyone want to visit an ordinary looking house? When it is the Sallie House, the most haunted place in Kansas, and one of the top ten most haunted places in the country. It is so scary to visit, there are no tour guides, you have to do a self tour. The story goes a doctor lived at the house and a young girl was brought to him with what turned out to be acute appendicitis. She died on the operating table in the house and has haunted it ever since. Several ghost hunter type TV shows have investigated the house and are convinced it is really haunted, by up to as many as three ghosts, two nice ghosts and one evil ghost. It was creepy to say the least. Here is what we found inside the house.

Here is a picture of the toy room where I found a magic eight ball. I asked it if the house was haunted and the response is below.

“It is decidedly so.” So there is your answer. Here is a polaroid picture of a recent ghost at the house.

Here is the operating table little Sallie died on. Very spooky. In the picture on the right, there appears to be two very ugly ghosts in the image of the little girl.

And finally, here are pictures of the various signs around the house.

Typically, stuff like this doesn’t bother me. However, while touring the upstairs, I was hit with a blast of cold air, believed to be a sign a ghost is present. It turned out to be the air conditioner turning on, but it scared the poop out of me none the less. If like like to be scared by the supernatural, this is a must visit. There is a link at the end of this post.

After having the wits scared out of us, we were hungry. We headed over to Ed’s Five and Dime for what was supposed to be the best pork loin sandwich in town.

The pork loin sandwich was very good, but the best, I’m not so sure about that. We will have to return to Atchison to try Willies pork loin sandwich, also alleged to be the best in town.

So how do you end a day of a museum and a haunted house? How about hanging out with some baby goats and petting and playing with them.

As you can tell from the number of pictures, we really enjoyed playing with the baby goats. If you want to try this, there is a link at the end of this post. I highly recommend it.

The next day we dropped Corrianne off at the airport. Upon our return home, we found these masked bandits stealing cat food near our neighbor’s garage.

The next day we went shopping and came across this great deal. Clearly, it is time to stock up on tomatoes.

We also received our local free newsletter. I found ads for four different county fairs within a 45 minute drive of our house. Jackson County, Platte County, Nemaha County, and Leavenworth County. The fairs are quite popular here. Due to the oppressive heat and humidity, we passed on going to any of them.