Day Three - Nebraska

Up and out early from Columbia, Missouri as planned. It was humid, but not as hot as the 100+ temperatures of yesterday. As soon as it was light enough to see, it was obvious that there were thunder storms all around us. It wasn't until just before we got to Kansas City that we really started to get rained on. We stopped at a McDonalds for a restroom stop and to put on our rain suits. After that we searched in a torrential downpour for the house where Mark was born. Unfortunately, it appears that the part of the street where his house was is now occupied by a Wal-Mart. Time marches on.....

We stopped at Denny's for breakfast. We didn't exactly receive a miracle in not getting rained on today, but we got really good service at Denny's....that is almost a miracle!

After breakfast, we hit some more rain while motoring around to the north side of Kansas City to head north on Interstate 29. A few miles into our trip up Interstate 29 we had to stop and take off our rain suits. It was obvious that we had escaped being wet for a while. The change was unbelieveable. The temperature had cooled off from the passing thunderstorms, the sky was blue, and there were several layers of clouds that just danced together as we enjoyed the 75 mph speed limit.


This stretch of road is the most scenic that we have enjoyed thus far. It is flat, but not as flat as I expected it to be. There are rolling hills and some some "ranges" of hills that almost pass for some of the topography back home.

The area is very agricultural with plenty of corn and soybeans. It strikes me that it must be a lot of work to maintain all of these crops. Some of the corn fields have signs in them, but not like you would see back east. Instead of politically motivated slogans like "Vote for Joe Blow" or "Defeat whatever legislation", there are signs that say "Choose Life", "Lord forgive us", and
"God answers prayer". Really enjoyed the ride today and felt more at peace with the scenery and sentiment than I have yet.

We made our final destination of Grand Island, NE by around 4:30 pm and took the opportunity to visit the local Harley-Davidson shop. Nice place that doesn't seem to price gouge like dealers in our area. Also, everyone that we have talked with since getting away from the big cities has just been so genuine and nice. It almost takes your breath away.

We took the recommendation of an employee at the harley shop and booked rooms at the Holiday Inn here in Grand Island.

Our plan is to start early again tomorrow and arrive in Hot Springs, SD for an early check-in at the hotel. It would be nice to have time to do a little local riding around the Black Hills before retiring for the evening tomorrow.


Oh, yeah....I almost forgot....here is a picture of a fat guy riding a motorcycle!