Riverside Park campground served well as our base to explore the area.  Most notable characteristic, it is right beside their zoo.  We heard tiger roars most every evening and morning….meal time?

Yikes, Plains weather!

A thunderstorm carrying huge hail, 2” diameter and larger, blasted through the area during the afternoon narrowly missing our campground.  Whew!  The sky cleared and the balloon glow went off spectacularly.  What a lovely end to a somewhat rocky day.  Then, BOOM, a crack of thunder brings me right up out of bed.  It is 2AM.  The sky flickers with lightning nearly constantly and in just a few minutes bang, bang, bang as huge hailstones hit the roof and the car parked beside us.  The noise is defining and the certainty of damage un-nerving.  The whole thing lasts probably 15 minutes.  A quick walk around confirms the bathroom ventilator is shattered.  Kent patches the vent with a bag and good ole duct tape and we are back to bed to deal with the rest in the morning.  Final count: three broken vent covers and the rooftop AC cover, tears in the slide cover, three cracks in the car windshield along with dozens of dents, and a handful of dents on the side and back of the trailer.  A bit of a mess but we are still road worthy and will deal with repairs as we move.     

August 2019 Scottsbluff Nebraska, site of the combined Old West Balloon Festival and the U.S. National Hot Air Balloon Championship.  One group, the national guys, fly competitively completing all sorts of assigned tasks to earn points.  They take off twice a day, when the weather permits, and make target drops at a location where the public can watch.  Wow they can dive and rise with great accuracy.  It is great to watch.  Mass ascensions don’t happen ‘til weekend and we need to be moving by then.  We do stay one extra day to see a night glow of about 50 balloons.  Humpty Dumpty and Marvin the Martian are here along with lot of beautiful racing balloons.     

Agate Fossil Beds National Monument protects a giant bonebed discovered in a long-buried watering hole.  Dated at approximately 19 million years ago, based on ash layers above and below the bonebed, the layer contains hundreds of mammal skeletons.  Scientists theorize they died in mass as a result of a drought.  Many animals, mostly herbivores, gathered at the few remaining pools, grazed off all nearby vegetation then died of malnutrition once there was no food close enough to the water.  The bones were buried in the remnants of the muddy pool.  Interesting scientific theory is set forth and the skeletons are amazing.  They have pieced together the lives of predators/scavengers and their role in this event as well.  Worth a visit even if it is really off the beaten path.

Another cool find in the area are the spiral tunnels of an ancient beaver-sort of.  He lived on/in the ground not water and in colonies sort of like prairie dogs.  The tunnels eventually filled with fine wind-blown sand and over time became sandstone in the shape of these amazing spirals.  Quite the puzzle for the geologists for a while.          

We just had to see it.  Created by a family it is said to be a replica of Stonehenge in scale and shape.  A picture says it all!  Check out what cars are used in this work.

There have been some pretty entertaining additions through the years.    The Fourd Seasons…symbolic of wheat through its growing phases.  Carsules..time capsules buried by various classes.  Chimes.  A Carnastoga Wagon.    

Not in the Nebraska of my childhood memories.  But they are all here, we have seen them.  Forces of wind and water have worn away some 500 feet of ancient high plains leaving only these isolated spires and towers.  Chimney rock, courthouse rock, jail rock and the granddaddy of them all Scotts Bluff.  This south west corner of Nebraska is dotted with famous formations along the Oregon Trail that have marked the way for First Nations peoples, trappers, explorers and settlers moving west.  Pretty impressive way-finding skills.  We can manage to get turned around even with a garmin!      

As for the auto tunnels, the drive to the summit in Scottsbluff National Monument passes through three of them, the only three in Nebraska.  Cool.  Even on a hazy day the view from the summit is amazing.  We make our way back down via Saddle rock trail with switchbacks across the shear faces and even a hand carved tunnel through one section.  We get a close up look at the 10 million-year timeline captured in the layers of rock exposed along the cliffs.  Wildflowers are pretty impressive too.

The Plains light house, it is 55 feet tall and made of native stone built by the Veterans Conservation Corp in the late 30s.  It never housed a light but does offer a great view of Lake Minatare. I would not have expected to find it but it looks good here.