Day 13 - ending at Scottsbluff, NE - Nebraska on the Open Road

August 17, 2019

Day 13 - ending at Scottsbluff, NE

Up at 5:50am this morning, after sleeping well. I was out the door at 7:43am, heading east along NE-2, looking for a place that serves breakfast. I arrived at Ken & Dale's Restaurant four minutes later. Their "Breakfast #5" had everything I like, and I added orange juice and coffee. I remembered to get ice at the restaurant this time, so, on my way out of Alliance, I just needed to pick up Gatorade and Clif Bars at the Git & Split Sinclair station.

Scottsbluff was my destination for today. On my original plan, I was to arrive there tomorrow night, and take a day off while there. Getting so far behind on report writing is bugging me, so I plan to get caught up there.

I left the Git & Split at 9:33am, and was at US-385 heading southwest at 9:47am. I had a beautiful, wide, concrete shoulder to ride on along this four-lane divided highway. Lots of trains on the tracks that parallel the highway on its southeast side. This morning I was able to tune in 102.3MHz - KPNY, a contemporary Christian station on my radio. They played a few songs I know.

At 10:50am I entered Morrill County, which has a few more hills, but none of them too bad. The four-lane highway became a two-lane highway for me at 11:30am. I stopped at noon to note my mileage so far, which was 15.6 miles.

At 12:20pm a pickup truck pulled onto the shoulder ahead of me. The driver is a mailman, and he said, "I would have been done, if I hadn't forgotten this," as he placed a letter in the box along the highway. He told me to go ahead, but as I passed the front of his truck, I had to stop. I've never seen a windshield so cracked! And the hood was all dented, also. The mailman said it was from the storm the night before last.

I came to an official rest area at 12:50pm. It was nice to get into some shade for a moment. At 1:31pm I passed though Angora, which was getting me close to my turn west, onto Link-62A. There was a weather sensor tower near here. The tower's wind indicator showed strong wind from the west. I wasn't looking forward to going right into the wind. But when I turned west, the wind just wasn't there! At first L62A was a long downhill for me, then flat. The going was good. I could already see Scotts Bluff in the distance - at least that's what it looked like to me. Along this stretch I listened some to 91.1MHz - KTNE, a Nebraska NPR station.

At 3:00pm I met up with US-26, and at 3:13pm entered Scotts Bluff County. I was also getting closer to the 20% chance of rain my sister Laurie had emailed me about. At 3:38pm I stopped to cover the front basket with plastic. I was thinking it would only be sprinkles, and that's all it was.

At 5:00pm I came to the gravesite of Rebecca Winters. If I'd been following my original routing, I would have missed this. Just as I was leaving, a train passed by, delaying my start of riding on the South Beltline Highway. I arrived at Monument Valley Pathway - a bike path - at 5:44pm, and Riverside Campground in Scottsbluff at 6:03pm.

The camp host set me up for two night's camping at a spot with a nice view of Scotts Bluff. There were no electric sites available, but the camp host arranged for me to use the output box at one of the occupied trailer camper sites. The host said the campground was full due to the Old West Balloon Fest, which was ending tonight.

After setting up, I ate supper from my lunch bag. Worked next on reports and pictures, then to bed at 9:50pm, with no alarm set!

Jeff

Spent: $14.73 plus $3 (breakfast) + $6.28 (Gatorade, Clif Bars) + $10 (campsite) = $34.01.

Day 13 - Alliance, NE to Scottsbluff, NE

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