Life is a Highway

It has been a quiet couple of days as we have gone across Nebraska. Let me just say, I had no idea there were so many cows in the US or that there was so much prairie space. Randy heard on the radio today that there are 3 times as many cows in Nebraska then there are people and we believe it. Plus they have these enormous feed yards. Sorry Troy, but they are disgusting!! It makes me question my decision to eat beef.

Yesterday we drove down from South Dakota and then across part of Nebraska on the Oregon Trail. For those of you that played the Oregon Trail as a video game when you were a kid, we did not die of dysentery nor get attached by Indians. Our most notable stops here were Scottsbluff and Chimney Rock which were key landmarks for pioneers as they headed west.

Today we are in Lincoln, Nebraska where I visited the International Quilt Museum. It is an amazing place which is part of the University of Nebraska. Tomorrow we have scheduled an oil change for the Jeep so that has determined our next stops. We will move on to Omaha, Nebraska for a couple of nights. Plan to visit the Strategic Air Command Museum just outside of Omaha and then do the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha on Saturday.

So far, we have been fortunate to avoid any of the major storms but tonight are supposed to have severe thunderstorms, hail, and high winds here. We will see…..

Before I talk about the Black Hills, let me explain a couple of new pictures from Cody, WY regarding Buffalo Bill. The first one is a picture of a restaurant in Cody that was once a bar owned by Buffalo Bill. The crazy thing, is if you look at the bar in the background it was given to him by Queen Victoria as a gift. The second picture is my attempt to join the Buffalo Bill Wild West show. Here I am with a couple of the performers. Unfortunately, neither my horse skills nor my sharp shooter skills were enough for me to join but Randy and I had fun taking the picture with a green screen at the museum.

Now, on to the Black Hills. We have been in the Rapid City, SD area for a couple of nights. Yesterday went to see Mt. Rushmore. Amazing the work they did on this massive sculpture and the lengths they went to make this a reality. They hung men down from the top of the mountain in these little swings that look like the swings that you put a toddler in on the set swings in a park. It was crazy. From there we went to Custer State Park. Probably the most impressive state park I have ever seen. Here, they have brought back herds of buffalo and as you can see from the pictures below, they have the right of way. Also saw, pronghorn antelope and burros. It rained all afternoon but it was beautiful and fun just the same.

Today, we spent the better part of the day in the Badlands National Park. It was overcast and cool but the rain held off. Again, no more words to describe beautiful and amazing. A lot of history here with the Sioux Indians. Not a very pretty history about our expansion to the west, however. This is were the Wounded Knee Massacre occurred in 1890. Very sad.

Tomorrow we leave South Dakota and head to Nebraska for a few days.

As of yesterday, we had been gone for 30 days. It’s starting to get hard to remember what we did, when. But I do know that the last 2 days we have been in Wyoming.

Yesterday, traveled through Yellowstone National Park. We had been there a number of years ago so didn’t spend time doing the whole park but did stop to visit sites along our route. Saw a lot of wildlife yesterday – buffalo, elk, and deer, and a grouse that stopped directly in front of us and held up traffic. Usually, its the larger animals that stop traffic but not for us.

Stayed in Cody, WY. Cody is named after Buffalo Bill Cody and they have a huge museum (27,000 sq ft) there about him, Native Americans of the area, guns of the era, and the area in general. We went to the museum this morning and it was interesting to see what an outdoorsman and skilled scout and hunter he was and then to have his notoriety be his legendary shows. He traveled all over the US and Europe and performed for leaders and royalty all over the world. At the turn of the century he had made $800,000-$1,000,000 from these shows. Not sure what that is in today’s money.

We left Cody mid morning and traveled across Wyoming to the Wyoming/South Dakota border. I have to say, today was my most restless day traveling. Even though the landscape was beautiful and varied, I was more than ready to get out of the vehicle at the end of the day.

Tomorrow we are on to Mount Rushmore area so it will be a shorter travel day and more opportunity to be out of the vehicle. See our new pictures below and drop us a note.