Halfway!- changes

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As of Friday Michael was at ~1720 miles on his bicycle and about halfway across the country (as the fingers measure on a computer screen ;) . Tonight they are in Hutchinson, staying with Trevor's uncle. Today is a long day because they are riding a stretch where there are no towns or anywhere that the group can stop to sleep. I should be able to post more pictures soon too! Keep checking.

The crew took a half day and split up to go play around with the day off. Dan went and bought a backpacking guitar so he could play music for the rest of the trip; in fact, he was playing it as Michael and I talked. Claire and Calum decided to go play at a waterpark in Wichita. Trevor's uncle picked him up so they could have family time before the whole crew arrived. Stavros, Nathan, and Michael set out together from Wichita to ride to Hutchinson.

For lunch they stopped at Anne's Variety store in Mt. Hope, KS. The place was being renovated, so the owners didn't have their health inspection certificate yet. As a result, the food was pretty cheap and the boys had to cook their own food that they bought at the store. The owner (maybe Anne??) helped them out with this and regaled them with her opinions about goat breeding. The woman was a serious goat breeder for a hobby and even got out her magazines of goat stock (males?) to breed. They got to hear how she liked the coloring and size of this one or that one, but perhaps the ears were too long and reached the mouth, a serious no-no in goats! I wonder if they have a Westminster type show for goats or if they are just at the state fairs and perhaps other events like that.

Hutchinson is home to underground salt mines, one of a handful like this in the world and one of the 8 wonders of Kansas! Salt, along with wheat, other crops, and fossil fuels, was important in establishing the wealth of Kansas because when the mines were founded salt was still very difficult to obtain. In addition to tours of the salt mine, places that have already been mined are now used as storage facilities for things from Hollywood movies to business records so that there are backups of information stored there. These vaults are somewhere around 350 feet below ground.

Now, what I want to know is why there? The website was sort of helpful here, but not very detailed. Of course, underground storage will remain at pretty constant temperatures year round and if there are no rivers nearby then it wouldn't be too humid. Kansas is pretty much right between the New Madrid fault and the Rio Grande Rift valley, so I suppose it is not super tectonically active. (I don't think most people know there is a very active and potentially dangerous fault in the middle of the country.)

However, I wanted geologic information on how salt came to be in Kansas. I didn't find much online so I'm speculating here. If you read this before it has changed because I've consulted my mom (she's a geologist). During the Cretaceous (and various other geologic periods) there has been a large inland sea in the midwest US. See below:


As you can see, in the area where Kansas is it may have been quite shallow. As the continent closed up and the sea evaporated it could have left a lot of salt deposits behind. My mom suggested that another support for the sea theory was that the limestone in Kansas is not very pure and has lots of sandy bits. This suggests that the area was a transition area: somewhere shallow where salt could collect, but this isn't necessarily on the coast. In contrast, the limestone in Missouri and Kentucky is fairly pure meaning they were out farther and deeper in the sea. The limestone forms the famous caves in this area.