Cedar Ridge Campground in Lawrence, Kansas May 14

On Wednesday, May 14, 2025 we left Ray Behrens Campground for a 4 1/2 hour drive to Cedar Ridge Campground outside of Lawrence, Kansas for a 7-night stay.

“Supernatural” TV Series

If you’re familiar with the TV series “Supernatural” then you know that Lawrence, Kansas is the hometown of brothers Sam and Dean Winchester. Series creator Eric Kripke has stated that he chose Lawrence because of its proximity to the Stull Cemetery, famous for its urban legend history.

Last year, Cindy and I watched all 15 seasons of “Supernatural” so we thought it would be fun to visit Lawrence. However, Lawrence has never capitalized on the fame of “Supernatural” and the only thing connected to the series is the Stull Cemetery. Unfortunately these days, local law enforcement arrests anyone they find in the now-off limits cemetery.

So, no “Supernatural” fun for us in Lawrence.

Cedar Ridge Campground

Cedar Ridge Campground is located about 20 miles west of Lawrence on Clinton Lake. The campground is one of several in this recreational area and has 101 campsites with electric and water hookups. There are three small comfort stations with flush toilets, a large restroom building with showers and laundry facility, and a playground area.

Our site was an asphalt pad that was NOT level (you can see how many boards we had to use under the rear stabilizers in the photos) but was satisfactory. In fact, we were surrounded by trees that were full of different birds and their constant singing was extremely pleasant. Plus, some of them, (like the Oriole) were so beautifully-colored that they were just wonderful to behold.

One of the Orioles kept coming to light on our steps and would chirp and sing, but then fly away as soon as we approached the door. We thought it might be singing for its supper, but we never carry bird seed with us because most places have rules about feeding the local wildlife.

Clinton Lake

Clinton Lake was formed by the construction of the Clinton Dam, which was completed in 1977. To improve the potential for fishing, the lake was slowly filled over a three-year period until pool level was reached in 1980. We’ve visited a lot of dams in our travels, but that’s the first time we had heard of slow-filling to increase the potential of fishing.

The lake has a surface area of 7,000 square acres and 85 miles of shoreline. Average depth is 7 feet and it is 55 feet deep at its maximum depth.

Clinton Lake provides flood protection for approximately 156 square miles of the Wakarusa River valley, and up to 10 million gallons of water per day to the City of Lawrence and surrounding communities.

Labs in Lawrence

We left the campsite Friday morning at 7:15 am to drive to Lawrence for Cindy’s scheduled lab tests at 8 am. These were fasting tests, so as soon as she was done at 8:25 am, we made a beeline to get some much-needed breakfast at a local Perkins Restaurant. And yes, I was hungry too because I fast in sympathy with her when she has these kinds of tests. I would never feel right eating when she could not.

Then we stopped by a couple of crafting stores for Cindy and two pet supply stores trying to get Bella’s favored food, before stocking up on groceries. We bought as much as we could fit in Nomad because there will be no nearby grocery store at our next stop farther along in Kansas.

Stormy Weather

We had some heavy thunderstorms all of Sunday night. Then Monday was clear and sunny until about 7 pm when more bad storms hit us until about 5 am Tuesday morning. Those storms had the potential for tornadoes, so we had our go-bags ready in case we got tornado alerts on our weather radio or heard the nearby siren go off.

Monday night, while the rain was coming down, we finished the first season of “Star Trek: The Next Generation”. I stayed up until about 1:30 am in case tornadoes came. If they had, we would have grabbed our bags and made our way to the brick restroom/shower building with Bella for some safer shelter.

At about 2:30 am I was awakened by the sound of torrential rains. But it sounded worse than that. It sounded like we were on the shore of a beach with waves slamming into the trailer. Just the sound, no movement. I thought someone was outside throwing buckets of water against the outside walls of Nomad. It finally calmed down around 4 am.

Once again, we were fortunate. Near St. Louis, where we had just left, tornadoes had pummeled the area the day before. We knew when we planned this route last year that we would be taking a chance of experiencing some dangerous weather, but so far we have managed to avoid the worst of what has hit this area of the country.

Tuesday

Tuesday was National Rescue Dog Day. I wrote about our experience with rescuing Bella (more like the other way around) on my personal blog where you can read it here. That night we watched “Captain America: Brave New World” on the DVD we got while we were in Lawrence a few days prior. I finished reading a fiction novel and started reading “Careless People”, a behind the scenes look at the mess that is Meta/Facebook.

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