Kansas Visitor's Guide 2007/2008 - (Page 38) M O R E W I D E - O P E N S PAC E S WHEREVER YOU TRAVEL in Kansas, you’re always close to one of the state’s well-kept parks or nature preserves. Many other parks and fishing lakes are cared for by communities and counties. Most offer a mix of fishing, boating, camping and hiking, and the chance to relax and watch nature. The panfish are always biting at Big Hill Lake, in a heavily wooded southeastern Kansas valley near Cherryvale (50 miles west of Pittsburg). If the fish take a break, you can stroll along the mile-long Ruth Nixon Trail through oak woodlands and bluestem prairies. There’s also a 17-mile-long bridle trail. Some of the best fishing in Kansas takes place in farm ponds. If you don’t know a farmer with a pond, dip a line into one of the two large and several small ponds neighboring the lake in Big Hill Wildlife Area. In northwestern Kansas, Keith Sebelius Lake is renowned for wipers, a hard-fighting hydrid of white bass and striped bass. The shores of this 2,500-acre prairie lake near Norton (about 95 miles northwest of Hays) also showcase an enclave of natural and pioneer Kansas history. The 1,150-acre Prairie Dog State Park is home to an expansive colony of the sociable little burrowing rodents who once colonized prairie meadows across the high plains. Within the preserve, you can also visit the last remaining adobe house in Kansas. A 19thcentury, one-room schoolhouse stands near the 1890s “soddy.” Much of Kansas once looked like Konza Prairie, an 8,700-acre preserve of natural grasslands and wildflowers carpeting the Flint Hills south of Manhattan. Administered by Kansas State University as a research station, Konza also is home to a small herd of buffalo. From turnouts on State-177 south of Manhattan, you’ll see sweeping vistas of the prairie and rolling, nearly treeless Flint Hills. For an up-close look, visitors can hike any of the three trails that weave through the tallgrass prairie. You don’t have to hike to acquaint yourself with Kansas’ famed grasslands, as you’ll find when you take a bicycle ride along a stretch of the Prairie Spirit Rail-Trail, extending 33 miles from Ottawa (25 miles south of Lawrence) south to Welda. The trail, covered with crushed limestone, follows the old Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway right-of-way. Along the mostly flat trail, you pass through farm fields, woodlands and, near Garnett, a restored prairie. In Ottawa, the 1888 limestone Santa Fe depot next to the trail houses the Old Depot Museum with 12 rooms of exhibits. Buffalo once gathered in herds so vast, they looked like black carpets across the Kansas prairie. Buffalo still roam free near Minneola at Big Basin Prairie Preserve (about 40 miles south of Dodge City). Primitive roads lead you through the preserve that sprawls across the meadowlike bottom and steep rim of an ancient sinkhole that’s a mile across and 100 feet deep. Buffalo and elk also graze the 2,560-acre Maxwell Wildlife Refuge (30 miles southeast of Salina). View the big animals from roads through the preserve, along the perimeter of the fenced grazing area, or take a tram ride onto the prairie for a closer look. ■ PHOTOGRAPH: PER BREIEHAGEN 38 38 00 2 0 0i6 iK a n sass s Gr st aiw i i y es uGd ed e O f f c a l V iani t o s VGsuat d rG i u i K ae o
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