Nebraska
We had a beautiful day. It was a little nippy but we had sunshine. The morning temperature in Council Bluffs, Iowa was 41 degrees and the high in Lincoln, Nebraska was 62 degrees and windy.
I woke up at 5:45 to go to the bathroom and then went back to bed. Larry woke me up at 7:10 because I asked him to. We wanted to get an early start. I got dressed and we had a quick breakfast. We put everything away and secure. We were at a full hook-up site so Larry emptied the tanks and filled the Minnie with water yesterday. He didn't want to do it today. We were on the road by 7:30.
We had to cross the Missouri River to get to Nebraska. A couple of days ago we went to Omaha via a bridge by the park. Today we used the interstate to enter Nebraska and used a different bridge. We wanted an early start because we had to go through Omaha and wanted to beat the crowd. Larry drove 80 miles today. It was mainly interstate. The interstate took us through Omaha and towards Lincoln. When we exited the interstate we were on a four lane highway. Lincoln was 60 miles from Council Bluffs.
We did a few tourist stops. We visited the Larsen Tractor Tester and Power Museum, International Quilt Museum, the Dairy Store and the Museum of American Speed. Three of these were located on the University of Nebraska-Lincoln campus. We parked the Minnie in the International Quilt Museum parking lot. It didn't open until 10:00 and it was 9:00 so we walked over to the Larsen Tractor Tester and Power Museum. It was a few blocks away. It located in an old building. It had a lot of old tractors and smelled of oil. It had signs in front of each tractor saying what it was and when it was tested. In 1919 Nebraska passed a law, where any tractor with 40 horsepower of more had to be tested on the required performance. The testing was done at the university and the records are held there. The testing is still being done. We watched a video about the museum and there was art on the wall by Craig Cassell. They were very special because he became a quadriplegia from an accident he had while swimming in the Little Blue River when he was 17 years old. He learned to draw with a pencil in his month. The art was outstanding. The gentleman, who ran the museum was very nice and greeted us when we came in and said if we had any questions just ask him and he would try to answer them. It was a self-guided tour. It was a great museum and had a lot to show you in a small building.
After doing the self-tour we walked back to the International Quilt Museum. It was in a gorgeous building. The displays were on three floors and there was a gift shop. It has quilts and quiltmaking from over 50 countries, dating from the 1600's to today. Some of the quilts are hand made and others are by machine. We saw quilts that were clothing, doll size, three dimensional, religious and more. We were disappointed because we didn't see any of Ken Burns quilts from his collection. The lady said his quilts were a traveling quilt exhibit. The displays were nice but it wasn't what we expected to see. I always thought quilts were more like blankets and didn't think of them as clothing. We had a nice self-guided tour. The ladies working there were very nice.
The Other Side Of The American Dream by Sunshine Joe Mallard 2012
After our tour of the International Quilt Museum we walked a half mile to The Dairy Store. It's a cute store on campus, that sells ice cream, cheese, meat and coffee handmade by UNL students at a on-site plant. The building is decorated to look like a dairy. The gentleman, who helped us was very nice. Larry read some reviews on the store before we came and people recommended the sweet corn ice cream. We had a scoop of the sweet corn and a scoop of the butterscotch. The sweet corn was interesting, it tasted like sweet corn and the butterscotch was good. It was a very clean and good service. As we were leaving we watched a short video on how they make the ice cream.
N Dairy Store
After eating the ice cream we walked back to the Minnie. Once there Larry programmed the Museum of American Speed into the GPS. It was about 6 miles from the campus. When we got to the museum we parked the Minnie in their parking lot. Then we had lunch.
After lunch we walked over to the Museum of American Speed. We were very surprised on how big it was. It took us over two hours to walk through the museum. Because today was the first day of the season we got in for $5 dollars each instead of $10 dollars. The exhibits were on three floors. The first floor exhibits were Landspeed, Drag Race, SCCA, NASCAR, Henry Miller, Indy, Smith Family, Open Wheel, Legends of Indy, Unser Collection, Herzog Motorsports, Indy 500 Pace Cars, Pikes Peak, Bill' Garage, Gas Station, Music Room, Unser Discovery, Restoration Shop, Leroy Byers Library, Show Cars, Legends in Racing and Drag Racing. The second floor exhibits were Model A/Ford Flathead, Chevrolet, Model T Accessories, Pikes Peak, Model Cars, Midget Race Cars, Quarter Midget Race Cars, Motorcycles, BMX, Sprint Cars, Art, Pedal Cars and Buck Rogers. The third floor exhibits were Tin Toys, Pedal Cars, Tether/Slot Cars, Soda Fountain and Taxi Cabs. The displays were everywhere. There was so much to see you will miss something. We had a great time.
Landspeed Car 1st floor
The final stop was Sandhills Global Event Center to camp for the night. It was twelve miles from the American Speed Museum. The next two days the Nebraska Cornhuskers College Rodeo is going on. We saw a lot of horses getting walked around the campground area. There was a lot of sites to plug in for the night, no problem finding one. Larry went online and paid for one night it was $39.14 per night for just power and water. Because there was an event they had showers available to use. They were just across the road from us and they gave us a code. It is just showers, no toilets. The sites are in a dirt lot, that go forever.
Once we had a spot we relaxed.
Larry did more research on where to go from here. He finished the book he started yesterday.
I played my games. I played the Daily Challenges of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: World Tour Mini of 10 games. It took me 35 minutes and 52 minutes to complete, which put me in 13th place in my group. I played Angry Birds Friends and Angry Birds 2.
I didn't do an evening walking because it was too wind and dusty. I ended up doing 8,000 steps.
