Small Town America

   When we travel and want to make time on the highway, we use the Interstates, but other times, when schedule is not a priority, we are "back roads" people.

   Case in point: Waterville Kansas, a city of around 680 souls, founded back in the 1860s, about 15 miles south of Marysville in Marshall County.

   We wanted to find a B&B close to Marysville where the Oregon Trail wagon trains crossed the Big Blue River. and booked a room at the Vintage Charm there in Waterville.

   The owners of the B&B were not around during our stay, but they welcomed us with a note on the door. Evidently there is little crime in the area. The mailbox was right by the door.

   We had booked one room, but there was no one else there, and we had the run of the whole house, both stories, kitchen, dining room and living room. Drinks in the fridge and homemade coffee cake sitting out on the counter for our breakfast the next morning.

   For supper we ate in the only place we found in the town, and we were the only customers.

   After supper we strolled the Main Street, no need to use the sidewalks, we just walked down the middle of the street looking at the stores on both sides in the heart of town.

   We observed 3 kids playing a game seated on the sidewalk in front of one of the storefronts. A lady coming from a building toward her car stopped and talked for a few minutes. One car moved slowly down the street, and we, being law abiding citizens (visitors), moved to one side to watch him pass by and move sedately toward the west.

   There was an opera house built in 1903 which was in use as a community theatre. This town located at the end of the railroad line, was a thriving spot back in the day.

   It was a neat town.

   We soaked up the local color and culture as we walked. We speculated on the people who had founded the town, and those that made up the local economy over the years.

   We will remember this adventure of ours for the sights and places we have visited. But for all the pomp of the Arch in St. Louis, and the majesty of Mt. Rushmore, we will have fond memories of a bunch of small towns, like Waterville, where the quiet progression of "people of the land", continue to move through the landscape of our Country, just as they have done for the last 150 or so years here in Kansas.

   Returning to our lodging, we are blessed by the sun setting in the west over fields of corn and soybeans, our senses renewed by the perseverance of small town America.