Had my first chance to get away from home following my accident at the end of April. (broken ankle) Visited family over Memorial Day weekend in Wichita, Kansas. My first time to visit there. I was very impressed with a well restored downtown area. Also adjacent to the downtown was a large area next to the river there where there are several museums...old Cowtown, an art museum, an interactive museum for kids, and so on. There were several kids in our group and I was very impressed that most of the YMCA's there have little water parks. I was most impresssed with the MUNICIPAL parks, they were scattered everywhere, and one of the larger city parks had it's own small gauge train ride, pony rides, and paddleboats for the lake within it. The kids in the group loved swimming at the Y, and going to the park. Plus, the downtown area is decorated with metal sculptures and water features are along most of those sculptures. At the motel we stayed at we picked up brochures for many different attractions...there was a Dixie Stampede brochure for Branson there, too! Wichita is still a fairly small city, and easy to get around in. If you have a chance, pass through some time, I think you will enjoy it, too.
And when you go, I wholeheartedly recommend driving a little further to the Underground Salt Museum: http://www.undergroundmuseum.org/index.php (http://www.undergroundmuseum.org/index.php) . It's a really interesting experience. An episode of Dirty Jobs was shot in this museum, and Hollywood stores films and movie props there - 650 feet below the Kansas Prairie. It was the highlight of our Wichita trip a couple of years ago. Then, coming back home, we took off the beaten path and saw the original Little House of the Prairie, as well.
Yes, I saw advertisments for the salt mine, too. Looks interesting. Also, the Little House on the Prairie site near Independence is a good place to go to complement a visit to the Laura Ingalls Wilder home at Mansfield, MO.