A Brief Southern Diversion

Crossing the Border - Grayson County, Texas

I didn't expect to find myself here today, but Dad had some issues that required his presence in Texas. After finishing up yesterday in Newport, Nebraska we headed down to more southern latitudes so  he could address a couple of things in person. 

Nothing catastrophic, to be sure. Just a few things that popped up during the normal course of day to day living, and I decided to accompany him during the long(ish) drive back.

I'm going to take a social media break for the next several days as we get the little niggling issues addressed and regroup a little.

More to follow what is likely to be a short diversion.

It was a good and uneventful drive. As the first time I've driven in literally months, I take that as very good sign.

Though completely unrelated to our diversion, any thoughts, prayers, and good vibes should be directed toward  the people of El Paso who are currently facing some very real and challenging circumstances. 

We're dealing with trivia, and we've been practicing that for at least the last four months.

Finding Our Way to Newport, Nebraska

Today was a spectacular day! Last night, it didn’t look like it was going to turn out that way, but it’s amazing what can happen when you just show up and do the work that the Universe lays at your feet.

The weather forecast looked ominous. Seventy to eighty percent chance of rain in the form of “scattered” thunderstorms. Seven am was supposed to dawn cloudy and wet with predicted precipitation coming in at just under half and inch of rainfall an hour.

We awakened at five, and started scrounging for breakfast. The only thing that seemed marginally appealing was a bagel with cream cheese. Now if I tell the truth, I don’t really like bagels all that much. Their only truly redeeming feature is that they serve as a passable conveyance for cream cheese, which is a tasty delight.

The convenience store up the street came to the rescue with an excellent egg, cheese, and bacon breakfast burrito. After one hundred and twenty four days on the road, I’ve become quite the connoisseur of gas station food. I’m not necessarily proud of that statement, but believe me when I tell you that there is a whole book, if not a television series on the Food Network, that should be dedicated to finding the best regional gas station or convenience store food. I’d be happy to host it because I know a good gas station breakfast burrito when I finally find one.

The clouds were heavy, but the promised rain had not started yet, so Dad parked his truck at an insurance agency and joined me for the first five miles.  Once again, we were able to follow the crushed pink granite that formed the foot friendly surface of the “Cowboy Trail.”

Cowboy Trail - Atkinson, Nebraska

Our feet crunched down the trail in unison, and we talked about his time on a farm raising turkeys, fishing, and began to cast about for our question of the day. 

About three miles in and adjacent to the “Sandhills Washout” (a place that livestock semis go to wash out their trailers after hauling some hogs), a light drizzle began to spit from the underbelly of the plum colored clouds.

“Do we want to stop and put on our pack covers?” Dad asked.

I tersely replied, “I don’t.” Now I don’t have anything in particular against pack covers. They have their uses like keeping your stuff dry, but they really make things inconvenient. I’d prefer to wait until it is beyond question that the sky is about to split open and deliver a good drenching. This is one area, among more than a handful, where my trail philosophy diverges from Dad’s own way of looking at life on the road.

We paced on, and though the sky continued to threaten, these threats proved a bluff, and we reached Dad’s five mile turnaround point with nothing much wetter than a twelve inch rain. That’s a rain where there are at least twelve inches between every drop that hits the ground.

Dad turned and headed back to the truck, and I continued on toward the west. About two hours later, the sun finally broke through the overcast, and though there were thunderstorms to the north and the south, I was able to watch their cottony tops descend to their fresh bruise colored undersides from the dryness that comes under the sweeping expanse of achingly blue sky.

Eventually the trail ran out, and I had to return to the highway. The traffic was light, and the shoulder was wide, so even this minor inconvenience worked out in the end.

Ranchland - Stuart, Nebraska

My foot felt good and my legs felt strong. A Navy sized dose of Vitamin M kept the soreness at bay, and I walked through the most verdant ranchland that I’d ever seen. Cows followed me along fences hoping for food, and old-school windmills harnessed the light breeze from the south to fill livestock tanks with water pumped up from the ground.

Big Blue Sky - Stuart, Nebraska

I met Dad again toward the end of the day. He’d pulled up the truck to a gas station listed for sale, and we walked the final part of the day’s journey into Newport, Nebraska. 

Entering Newport, Nebraska

Having covered a little over seventeen hundred and sixty one miles since leaving Newport, Rhode Island, we wrapped up the day’s efforts in front of the Newport (Nebraska) Pool Hall. The pool hall is a community space serving the ninety-seven residents of this small Nebraska town with a three stool bar, a single pool table, and a handful of snacks. The hall is open without any oversight twenty four hours a day. We signed the guest register and took a few photos before heading back to the truck.

Newport Poll Hall - Newport, Nebraska

Today was an exceptionally good day!

The Cowboy Trail

We finally made it back on the trail today after a couple of days taken to help heal a blister about the size of a silver dollar on the bottom of my left foot. That foot’s still not one hundred percent, but it felt alright, and we managed to cover the twenty mile gap between O’Neill and Atkinson, Nebraska.

It was a great day for a stroll. The sky was mostly overcast although a little blue peeked out from around the clouds from time to time. Temperatures started in the low 60’s and rocketed all the way up to the mid-70’s by early afternoon. For my Texas readers, I’m sorry, but Nebraska is only a couple days drive away. I might be time for your own pilgrimage off the anvil of the sun to someplace a little more temperate.

Cowboy Trail - Holt County, Nebraska

We covered the entire distance today on a small section of the one hundred and ninety-five mile “Cowboy Trail” in the outback section of central Nebraska. On the section we’re on, the trail loosely parallels US Highway 20, known as the “Outlaw Trail,” but it gets far enough from the highway for wildlife sightings and a great scenic walk.

I passed signs today prohibiting this use of the trail by both motor vehicles as well as cows, and I’m in full agreement with both of those sound policies.

No Cows Allowed - Cowboy Trail

Along the path, we saw more than a handful of rabbits, a couple of fairly large hawks, and two groups of six or seven wild turkeys. 

Now I know it’s a pretty common occurrence to see the annual Thanksgiving Turkey Trot 5K run advertised in most of our hometowns. Usually there’s a picture of a plump turkey with really short legs trotting at a reasonable pace. Based on these images, I always imagined that turkeys were ungainly beasts capable only of a light jog.

I can tell you from my experience today, that is NOT the case at all.  I spotted the first bunch of turkeys off to the left side of the trail in a pasture. I was too far away to get any pictures, but I thought I’d walk up a little closer and maybe snap a few shots. These wiley beasts somehow caught wind of my presence. I don’t know. I showered and had on clean clothes, but somehow they sensed me anyway. They took off at what looked like a walk and disappeared behind a row of round hay bales.

“No problem,” I thought to myself. I’ll just walk to the end of the hay, and they’ll be there. I walked past the hay and glanced toward the turkeys. They were more than halfway to a treeline a couple of hundred yards in the distance. I’d only covered about twenty yards. I started to jog. They picked up their pace, and the distance widened even further.

As I slowed to a stop, the last turkey in line glanced back at me over her right shoulder as if to say, “Silly human. Turkey Trot means we can actually run. You have no chance of outpacing us on the ground.” It’s a pretty good dialog for a glance from a turkey, but I’m pretty sure that’s what she was communicating.

This evening, I did a little research, and it turns out that a wild turkey can run at speeds exceeding twenty five miles per hour. The fastest human recorded to date is sprinter Usain Bolt who clocked in at just under twenty eight miles per hour in his record setting one hundred meter dash.

This will come as no surprise to most of you, but in the interest of full disclosure, I’m no Usain Bolt when it comes to burning up the track. More of slow smolder, if I’m lucky. 

That made me feel a little better about being outrun by a pack of wild birds. Today was a good saunter, and we’ll see what tomorrow will bring. 

Hope you all had a great Thursday!

Another Blister Rest Day

Another day of rest in the self-proclaimed Irish Capital of Nebraska - O’Neil.

Sidewalk Art - O’Neill, Nebraska

Got out on the town a little to test the foot. Apparently the town takes their claim seriously since these shamrocks were painted on the sidewalks at every intersection.  

Foot feels better so....

Ready or not, back to the trail tomorrow.

Pulled up in O'Neill

No pictures today. It's hard to get snapshots of the inside of your eyelids. 

Took a much needed day off to try to get ahead of a blister on the bottom of my left foot. I ended up sleeping till 1130, and that felt pretty good.

Another Long Day with Another Surprise Visit

Today was another long day, but a good one. With Dad’s help we managed to put in a little over twenty two miles. Dad walked along for about thirteen of them, so it looks like his foot is well on its way to a full recovery.

The Road to the West - Between Orchard and O’Neill, Nebraska

The first half of the walk happened along the shoulder of US Highway 20 between Orchard, Nebraska and O’Neill, Nebraska. The road was mostly flat, straight, and relatively empty.

For reasons not completely clear to me, we ran across a fairly large number of fairly small toads along the fringe of the road. Once again, a couple of them seemed bent on making the treacherous journey across the highway to a spot where the grass was just about the same level of greenness as the side they were bent on departing.

Dad was with me, and we did our best to chase them back into the grass on our side of the road. We were pretty successful, but one hard headed amphibian simply would not be herded.

I chased him to about the middle of the highway, and, finally fed up with his apparent intransigence, I picked him up and carried him back from whence he came.

The road was flat and straight and disappeared into the western horizon. On both sides of the road, the corn and soybeans finally yielded the space to vast fields dedicated to the production of hay. Row after row of freshly cut prairie hay weighing approximately twelve hundred pounds apiece littered the fields.

This subtle change in crop production is a little thing, but it’s the sort of change that keeps the walk interesting. It raises all sorts of questions, and the more I learn, the more I realize how much I really don’t know. How do farmers decide whether to plant corn, soybeans, or produce hay? How do these individual and apparently uncoordinated decisions drive market conditions later in the season at sale time? What do you do with a twelve hundred pound bale of hay that doesn’t sell, and how long will it last? All sorts of questions.

Closing out a productive day of walking, another Navy colleague called just as we were wrapping up our pedestrian efforts for the day. He was going to be passing through town on his way to visit family in South Dakota, and, once again, we were afforded the opportunity to catch up, tell a few tall tales, and participate in some good conversation. It’s the sort of thing that makes long stretches of solitude out on the road worth every step.

A Short Train and a Parade

Today was a long(ish) day after a series of long days, but it was a good one as well. 

Orchard Days Parade - Orchard, Nebraska

We managed to get caught up in a parade during Orchard Days in Orchard, Nebraska. It looked like the whole town was participating. Flags were marched, the school band played, tractors and the Shriner cars cavorted around, and candy was thrown to the kids along the path. It was pretty fun, and I was tired so taking a break to watch a parade was a welcome rest.

Short Train - Royal, Nebraska

We also saw the shortest train we've seen to date. Two locomotives to pull a tank car and a grain car. Wonder what's going on there?

Hope you all had a great Sunday. I going to get some sleep.