June 3, 2008

 

We got up this morning at 7:15am to birds singing and the sun shining.  Breakfast consisted of Chris’ favorite: cereal and orange juice.  Packing the camper was easier today since we have done it once before.  I imagine by the time we get to Alaska we will be very good at packing and knowing the order of packing and where to pack things.  Right now it is a challenge to remember where things are and which things to put in the camper and what to put in or on the suburban.

 

Devotions for today are Proverbs 1 about wisdom calling to us and will we choose to listen.  The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.

 

The scenery in Nebraska is nice with the grass so green and the sky so blue. Not far from our campground, we went under the Great Platt River Road Archway Monument.  It was impressive so we took a picture of it.  I-80 follows the Platt River with many lakes/ponds beside the highway in Nebraska, which reminds us of South Dakota.  Nebraska along I-80 is pretty flat with some small hills, very pleasant to look at.

 

Lunch today was at the nicest Pizza Hut I have ever been to.  It seemed clean and large and since we hadn’t been in the mountain timezone for very long, we were some of Pizza Hut’s first lunch customers.  They were just getting the pizza out on the buffet.  It was delicious.  The Pizza Hut  in Sidney, Nebraska was right across the street from Cabella’s World Headquarters.  The Hartley’s told us that Cabella’s started as a small mom and pop store in downtown Sidney and it has grown to what it is today with huge stores all over the world.

 

We entered the Mountain Time Zone at mile marker 149 at 11:00 am (CST)

 

We continued on I-80 to Cheyenne  where we took I-25 north to Buffalo. Cheyenne had memories for us as we stayed in the smallest camping spot when we went to Yellowstone a few years ago.   I am sure there was less than one foot clearance on either side of our camper and we were between two other campers. Our door couldn’t open completely.  We didn’t need to find a campsite this time we were just passing through.

 

Wyoming is arid in the southern area that we drove through.  As we traveled north, the land became more lush with green grass and rolling hills.  Antelope are on many hillsides and don’t seem to mind us being within sight of them.  Apparently they are not as skiddish as deer.  Sarah tried to count antelope for a while until she had more than 50 then she found something else to do.

 

We read some of the Little Britches story today in the car.  Chris read all of a book about finances that the McKinley’s gave him for graduation.  Aleesha is reading a book Lindsey loaned her.  There was less sleeping in the car so we must have slept well last night.

 

Supper was at a rest area on I-25 around Douglas, Wyoming.  There were lilac bushes in bloom.  They smelled so good. We had sandwiches, chips, and fruit.  Tim and Sarah were fixing sandwiches but they needed to know if Chris wanted mayo on his ham sandwich.  We thought we had the place to ourselves.  Without looking up Sarah saw someone walk by our picnic table and said “Do you like mayonnaise?”  The person was not Chris it was an older man on his way to the bathroom.  We laughed and laughed.  He must have wondered why this little girl wanted to know if he likes mayo.  Our ice cooler is keeping things so cold it is hard to put your hand into the water in the bottom of the cooler.

 

We stayed the night in Buffalo, Wyoming with our cousins Randy, Barb, Lynn and Lee Hartley.  Tim and Randy reminisced about family get-togethers when they were kids as the rest of us laughed and laughed at picturing these two grown men with grey in their hair and beards as children riding their bikes, playing in the creek behind Randy’s house and getting into all sorts of trouble.  The writers of the Dennis the Menace series could use their stories to make many more cartoons.   Our children found out the stories Tim tells about his cousins really are true.  We sure enjoyed our time with the Hartley’s.  They have a very nice place with the Big Horn Mountains visible from their living room window and a creek beside the house.  We didn’t let the kids go outside after hearing their dad’s stories about rolling boulders and a car down the creek banks ; -)

 

The temperature in Buffalo was much cooler than we have felt for a while, probably around 50 degrees when we arrived.  It was cool enough in the camper that we used an extra blanket and pulled it up around our necks.  We were toasty warm in our beds.  I wonder how cool the temperatures will get on this trip.  We didn’t use any sort of heater in the camper.  It rained a little thoughout the night.

 

Mileage for the day: 650

Temperature high: 80 in Nebraska; 60 in Wyoming

Camping fee: $0

Price for gasoline: $3.79