In Episode 395 of the RV Miles Podcast, we discuss the subtle red flags to watch out for when booking campgrounds. We also expand on why top-tier fuel is essential for your RV, truck, or car, and dive into our experience at the Kansas City RV Show, where we saw two great brands local to the KC area,…In Episode 395 of the RV Miles Podcast, we discuss the subtle red flags to watch out for when booking campgrounds. We also expand on why top-tier fuel is essential for your RV, truck, or car, and dive into our experience at the Kansas City RV Show, where we saw two great brands local to the KC area, @vandoitco and @campinawe
AAA's full study on Top Tier gasoline: https://www.aaa.com/AAA/common/AAR/files/Fuel-Quality-Full-Report.pdf_____
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Track SSTK_MUSIC_ID 437726– Monetization ID MONETIZATION_ID AMXDXB4BX5FLHUYE
00:00 Introduction01:10 Fuel Stops and Top Tier Gasoline Discussion10:45 Campground Red Flags Introduction17:44 Photo Quality and Campground Names23:18 Former KOAs and Check-in Restrictions27:44 Unexpected Campground Fees30:02 Outdated Reservation Systems34:07 Winter RV Safety Tips37:47 Kansas City RV Show Highlights49:26 Local Coffee Shop Discovery52:11 Conclusion and Announcementsmore
In this feature-length video essay that explores the role places play in storytelling, Rolf examines how Kansas -- his home state -- has been imagined, distorted, and mythologized in cinema and television for more than a century.
Blending archival film clips, historical analysis, and deeply persona…In this feature-length video essay that explores the role places play in storytelling, Rolf examines how Kansas -- his home state -- has been imagined, distorted, and mythologized in cinema and television for more than a century.
Blending archival film clips, historical analysis, and deeply personal narration, Kansas Never Plays Itself traces how cinematic shorthand shapes our collective imagination. The video essay invites viewers to reconsider what it means for a location to “play itself” — and what’s lost when the real landscapes and communities behind our most beloved stories remain unseen.
Sneak preview of the video essay is online here.
Chapters:
0:00 - Intro: Not in Kansas Any More
Movies and TV shows mentioned: The Wizard of Oz (1939); Showdown at Abilene (1956); Gunsmoke (1955-1975); Dances with Wolves (1990); Kansas (1995); Capote (2005); The English (2022).
2:00 - Part 1: No Place Like Home (or, Hollywood can’t tell the truth about places)
Movies and TV shows mentioned: Suits (2011); Law & Order: SVU (2006); Elementary (2019); The Affair (2014); Slumber (2017); Vancouver Never Plays Itself (2015); Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003); Panic in the Streets (1950); Wichita (1955); Stark: Mirror Image (1986); Seinfeld (1992); Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987); The Ice Harvest (2005); The Beach (2000); Mutiny on the Bounty (1962); Brigadoon (1954); Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989); Star Wars: A New Hope (1977); Game of Thrones (2012); The Game Camera (2025).
15:05 - Part 2: Why Place Matters (or, The Wizard of Oz and Superman might be a little bit racist)
Movies and TV shows mentioned: The Wiz (1978); The Wizard of Oz (1933); The Wizard of Oz (1925); The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1910); Oz the Great and Powerful (2013); Wicked (2024); Smallville (2001); Superman IV: The Quest For Peace (1987); Man of Steel (2013); The Music Man (1962); Meet Me in St. Louis (1944); Gone with the Wind (1939); Swing (1938); Birthright (1939); Lying Lips (1939); Shaft (1971); The Learning Tree (1969); Oscar Micheaux documentary (2021); Adventures of Superman (1952–1958); Superman (1978).
32:25 - Part 3: Why Location Matters (or, How movies lie when depicting places
Movies and TV shows mentioned: Office Space (1999); Swingers (1996); Little Shop of Horrors (1986); Avatar (2009); The Matrix (1999); The Breakfast Club (1985); Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986); Splendor in the Grass (1961); Picnic (1955); Stand by Me (1986); Kansas (1988); Paper Moon (1973); In Cold Blood (1967); In Cold Blood TV miniseries (1996); Capote (2005); Infamous (2006); Smoke Signals (1998); Geronimo (1962); Navajo Joe (1966); Masterson of Kansas (1954); Buffalo Dance (1894); Last of the Renegades (1964); “Keep America Beautiful” PSA (1971); In the Land of the Headhunters (1914); Among the Cannibal Isles of the South Pacific (1918); The Rider (2017); Reservation Dogs (2021-2023).
54:15 - Part 4: Why Kansas Matters (hint: it’s because all places matter)...more
Hear about travel to Kansas as the Amateur Traveler discusses a recent trip to Wichita, Kansas, for a conference and a post-conference Old West themed press trip.
This week's show is supported by the new Smart Travel Podcast. Travel smarter — and spend less — with help from NerdWallet. Check out Sm…Hear about travel to Kansas as the Amateur Traveler discusses a recent trip to Wichita, Kansas, for a conference and a post-conference Old West themed press trip.
This week's show is supported by the new Smart Travel Podcast. Travel smarter — and spend less — with help from NerdWallet. Check out Smart Travel here.
Why should you go to Kansas?
Chris says, "This is a state that surprised me. I wasn't planning on doing an episode on this trip, but Kansas surprised me. The history and the food were all memorable. The press trip I did was about the Old West, so we visited sites about native americans, the Santa Fe Trail, railroads, cowboys, lawmen, and then later on the manufacturing of airplanes."
Start in Wichita. Drive two hours northeast to Council Grove, a historic stop on the Santa Fe Trail.
Day 1 – Council Grove and Abilene
Kaw Mission State Historic Site: Learn about the Kanza (Kaw) tribe for whom Kansas is named, and the short-lived Methodist mission school built after the tribe ceded land to the U.S.
Allegawaho Memorial Heritage Park: The only remaining Kanza-owned land in Kansas, used for powwows and home to a sacred red rock recently repatriated from Lawrence.
The Last Chance Store: Once the final supply stop for wagons heading southwest toward Santa Fe.
Lunch: Eat at Hays House, founded in 1857 and considered the oldest restaurant west of the Mississippi.
...
https://amateurtraveler.com/travel-to-kansas/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesmore
Kansas is a big place, and not one particularly well-known for national park destinations. But that doesn't mean you should overlook the Sunflower State.
In the closing days of September, as the country seemed destined for a government shutdown, the Traveler's Kurt Repanshek and Patrick Cone headed…Kansas is a big place, and not one particularly well-known for national park destinations. But that doesn't mean you should overlook the Sunflower State.
In the closing days of September, as the country seemed destined for a government shutdown, the Traveler's Kurt Repanshek and Patrick Cone headed into Kansas to visit some of the parks there to better understand their role in the National Park System.
And we were not disappointed. Back in 2022 Kurt made a similar trip, and stopped at Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve in the Flint Hills of central Kansas. During that stop Ranger Eric Patterson gave Kurt a wonderful tour of the preserve and explained its history.
Eric has moved on, but during Kurt and Patrick's recent visit Heather Brown, the preserve's chief of interpretation, sat down with them to discuss the preserve in general and the tallgrass prairie specifically.
During their swing through Kansas, Kurt and Patrick also headed to Nicodemus, a well-off-the-beaten path destination in the National Park System, one so far off the beaten path that the state of Kansas does Nicodemus National Historic Site a tremendous disservice by providing very little signage showing you how to get to Nicodemus.
But stay determined and you can find the site. While the Park Service only claims five buildings at Nicodemus, and only two are open, the history of how the townsite was founded in post-Civil War America by more than 300 previously enslaved peoples is an uplifting history of self-determination, grit, and perseverance.
What follows are two conversations they had with rangers – before they were furloughed when the government shut down – at the two sites, LueCreasea Horne Horn at Nicodemus National Historic Site and Heather Brown at Tallgrass prairie.more
“I hate the Kansas City Chiefs with a passion reserved only for things that I love.” —Tod Goldberg
In this episode of Deviate, Rolf shares his 2002 NPR “Savvy Traveler” dispatch about trying to watch the Super Bowl in Thailand (3:00); then he and Tod Goldberg discuss how they became NFL football fan…“I hate the Kansas City Chiefs with a passion reserved only for things that I love.” —Tod Goldberg
In this episode of Deviate, Rolf shares his 2002 NPR “Savvy Traveler” dispatch about trying to watch the Super Bowl in Thailand (3:00); then he and Tod Goldberg discuss how they became NFL football fans as kids in the 1970s, and how this affected their fandom later in life (8:00); how it could be difficult in the days before the Internet for kids to find information about NFL teams and players, and which books they read about the early days of pro football (23:00); the origins of the San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs in upstart pro leagues, their more recent fortunes in the NFL, and how the last Chiefs Super Bowl appearance was nine months before Rolf was born (38:30); on watching Super Bowls from overseas and following the Chiefs (or 49ers) as adults, the strengths of the 2020 Chiefs and 49ers teams, and the emotional stakes of Super Bowl LIV (49:00); how the Chiefs have dominated the AFC in the four years since 2020, how this success has affected people’s perception of them, and how the Chiefs’ Midwesternness makes them different from other NFL dynasties (1:05:30); the role superstition plays in sports fandom, how some team fandom comes out of love for individual players, how fandom creates a leveling of social classes, and the merits of “fair weather” fandom (1:10:30).
Novelist Tod Goldberg (@todgoldberg) is the New York Times bestselling author of over a dozen books, most notably the Gangsterland series of crime novels. He is also the director of the University of California-Riverside Palm Desert Low-Residency MFA.
NFL games and players:
Super Bowl LIV (2020 KC Chiefs versus SF 49ers NFL title game)
Rolf Benirschke (San Diego Chargers placekicker in the 1980s)
The Catch (touchdown reception in the 1981 NFC Championship Game)
Christian “Nigerian Nightmare” Okoye (Chiefs fullback in the 1980s)
Mike Mercer (NFL punter in the 1960s)
Marshall Goldberg (Jewish Chicago Cardinals running back in the 1940s)
1934 NFL Championship Game, aka the “Sneakers Game” (title game)
1940 NFL Championship Game, (73-0 Bears-Giants title game)
Steve Grogan (New England Patriots quarterback in the 1980s)
Ed “Too Tall” Jones (Cowboys defensive end in the 1980s)
Super Bowl IV (1970 Chiefs versus Vikings NFL title game)
NFL Films: Super Bowl IV Highlights (sports documentary)
Hank Stram (Chiefs coach from 1960-1974)
Len Dawson (Chiefs quarterback in the 1960s and 1970s)
Todd Blackledge (Chiefs 1983 draft-pick quarterback)
Joe Montana (quarterback who won four Super Bowls with the 49ers)more
