Hank – I used our rest day to explore the town. Lakin is the county seat and hosts the Kearny County Museum. I walked there to check it out. The museum is in a great building and appears to be well supported financially. There are tons of artifacts and exhibits. Lots of cool stuff. There’s also a house on the grounds that was originally owned by the first depot agent with the Sante Fe Railroad, Alonzo Boylan. It was purchased in 1916 by the O’Loughlin family and moved to its present location. (John O’Loughlin founded the town in 1873.) Also on the grounds is the Columbia Schoolhouse, which was originally north of Lakin and moved to its present site in 1978. The Santa Fe depot was purchased after the company closed it. It was also moved to its present location by the museum and schoolhouse. One thing that was lacking is that there’s little, if any, story telling. Many items had tags stating who donated them. But it was cool to see everything.

Outside of that, I walked around town some more and eventually returned to our hotel. Kathy and I went over a rough draft of the remainder of our adventure. We’ve come so far and yet we still have a ways to go. Ballpark figure is we have 2800 miles to go.

Kathy – It’s considered a rest day so I rested. Hung out in the hotel room and read a lot, planned the route for our last ten states, and watched a little HGTV which I haven’t seen in ages. Hank will be happy to hear that I have so many house renovations planned now! 😄 Didn’t bother getting outside in the 30 mph winds, just enjoyed the down day at the hotel. 💗