Letterboxing Along US 54

We are off again on another trip. Thomas is attending a conference in Pratt, Kansas and I am tagging along. The conference is S.P.I.R.I.T. (Southwest Passage Initiative for Regional and Interstate Transportation) and is focusing on trying to get funding and approval for the upgrade of US 54. They want to four lane the highway from Wichita, Kansas to El Paso, Texas. One of the main reasons I wanted to tag along on this trip was because I wanted to find letterboxes in Kansas so I could add that state to my map.
So we left Santa Fe early this morning and drove to Clines Corners and through Santa Rosa to Tucumcari. This is where we hit US 54 and headed northeast. There were no letterboxes for me to find along US 54 in New Mexico so we just drove. We made our first stop in Dalhart, Texas. Here we looked for three boxes (well we looked for one and kind of looked for two others). The first box we looked for was The Empty Saddle by Wag Time. This box is hidden in Memorial Park Cemetery and when we arrived there was a funeral going on but it was on the opposite side of the cemetery from where the box is hidden. I easily found the box and stamped in while sitting in the car. I replaced the box and then we headed out. Usually I like to walk around the cemetery and take some pictures but I didn't want to impose on the ceremony so we just decided to move on. Next we made a stop at the Dallam/Hartley Veterans Memorial. The box was marked as retired but I took the clue just to make a stop at the memorial. I quickly looked for the box but didn't find it. Then we drove to where the Mission Twin Theater was supposed to be. There was a comment left that said the theater had now been turned into a evangelical center.

Stratford Station

So we drove by but didn't even stop to look for the box. From here we took a detour off of US 54 and headed east on TX 297 and ended up in Cactus, Texas. We made our way to Tumbleweed Drive to look for a box by jb kokopelli. We needed to find a sign but we drove up and down the road twice and never found the sign we needed. We then noticed an area on the side of the road that had been torn up and they were doing some kind of water or gas main work and I got this strong feeling that that was where the box had been. As we looked around we found a pile of cross ties (which was mentioned in the clue) and decided that the box might be in the pile. But we didn't have any luck finding the box.  To get ourselves back on track we headed north on US 287 and rejoined US 54 in Stratford, Texas. Here we looked for two boxes by Wag Time. We didn't find Beauty Shop Bygones but we had more luck finding The Stratford Station. After stamping in and replacing the box we filled the car with gas and then headed out to continue our trip along US 54.

It wasn't long before we crossed into the panhandle of Oklahoma and then into Kansas.

Welcome to Kansas

We did make a stop in Oklahoma but it wasn't for any letterboxes so I am going to write about the trip from just a driving point of view without letterboxing and you can read about that at Driving US 54 . . . and get a little information about another road that was used to cross the United States before the building of our interstate system. Once in Kansas we made our first stop in Liberal, Kansas. We drove to New Hope Church and easily found my first box in Kansas - Holy Grail by SunStateStamper. I stamped in and was so happy to be able to add another state to my letterboxing map. After I replaced the box we headed over to "The Land of Oz" just for the fun of it and to kind of look for a letterbox (which had a few attempts). We didn't find the box because we didn't find the landmark we needed - so we made an assumption that the box was gone. Then we continued on US 54 and made our next stop at a rest area just past the Cimarron River to look for the Nightwatch Box by Aspen. I think I found the right place because I found some flagstone that was mentioned in the clue but I didn't find the box. Time to continue on because with all the little stops we made it was getting late. This was our last stop of the day for letterboxing because it wasn't long before it got dark (since the time change last weekend). So we just drove until we reached Pratt. It was an interesting day eye opening - this part of the country is quite different from anywhere else I have been. Anyway, we had a great day and found a few nice boxes along the way.