Dusting off this thing
So here I am in the States-suburban Kansas City, Kansas to be more precise-to spend my annual two-week holiday visiting wolfpaws and his boyfriend Todd. I've actually been here for the past nine days but that time has passed distressingly quickly, and I'm bothered even more by the fact that I haven't yet gone out on my own to sightsee and really take in this change of scenery I'd been craving.
The problem is that one really must have a car or some other kind motor vehicle to be able to go anywhere around here. Kansas City's suburbs are so spread-out and low-density that in most cases it's just not practical to walk even to the nearest grocery store, and there's not much public transit service to speak of either. While it would be possible for me to get from the house where I'm staying to downtown KC by bus-at least according to the transit system map and schedules I've seen-I'd have to time my trip very carefully so as not to miss the bus I want to take, otherwise I'd have to wait up to an hour for the next one. And that's assuming I didn't miss the last one, which is easier to do than one might think; the last buses on the two routes that pass nearest the house leave between 6:00 and 7:00 PM.
Still, if I want to return home without feeling that I again almost entirely squandered my free time here, I'll have to attempt at least one trip downtown (where I gather most of the sights most interesting to me are) and back before the weekend. At least the bus fare is cheap, the weather is fairly nice, and the city centre is pretty walkable, not to mention beautiful. I don't have even a cell phone camera, so I'll have to try to find one of those disposable film ones if I want to finally have at least a small photographic record of one of my visits here. But are those things even sold anymore?
The problem is that one really must have a car or some other kind motor vehicle to be able to go anywhere around here. Kansas City's suburbs are so spread-out and low-density that in most cases it's just not practical to walk even to the nearest grocery store, and there's not much public transit service to speak of either. While it would be possible for me to get from the house where I'm staying to downtown KC by bus-at least according to the transit system map and schedules I've seen-I'd have to time my trip very carefully so as not to miss the bus I want to take, otherwise I'd have to wait up to an hour for the next one. And that's assuming I didn't miss the last one, which is easier to do than one might think; the last buses on the two routes that pass nearest the house leave between 6:00 and 7:00 PM.
Still, if I want to return home without feeling that I again almost entirely squandered my free time here, I'll have to attempt at least one trip downtown (where I gather most of the sights most interesting to me are) and back before the weekend. At least the bus fare is cheap, the weather is fairly nice, and the city centre is pretty walkable, not to mention beautiful. I don't have even a cell phone camera, so I'll have to try to find one of those disposable film ones if I want to finally have at least a small photographic record of one of my visits here. But are those things even sold anymore?