SUMMER 2014

We had intended on spending this summer in Spearfish, SD but an opportunity presented itself so we ended up working as camp hosts at Longview Lake Campground in Lee's Summit, MO.  This gave us a chance to spend some time with our son, John, and his family.  They live in Boonville, which is about 2 hours east of Lee's Summit.

This campground is gorgeous.  It's almost hard to believe that it's just a few minutes from downtown Kansas City.  We have seen so many deer here.  One morning on our way to town we saw 17 deer from our campsite to the main road.  There are some pretty impressive turkey in this area as well.

Longview was actually a community established in the early 1900's by Robert Long.  He owned about 1000 acres here.  This would have been considered his summer home.  He had a large dairy operation, several kinds of horses.  There was a big horse barn.  His daughter was a well known equestrian and had a lot to do with the American Royal, here in the Kansas City area.  There were several houses surrounding Longview Mansion for people that worked for Mr. Long.  A lot of those buildings are still standing.   His main residence was in Kansas City and is actually used as the Kansas City visitor center, now.  Mr. Long was a lumberman.  He eventually left this area and established a town in the state of Washington called Longview, as well.  There is a subdivision not too far from the campground and all the homes are built to look like they are from the 1920's.  Longview Community college, now Metro Community College is within this community, also, with some little shops across from it...Like Subway and a pizza place to name a few.  It's really a very nice area.  I'm glad we decided to spend our summer here.