Day 2 - Saturday, June 13 - Trains!!!!
So the game plan for the day was to get on the road around 8:00 AM and head towards Cheyenne, WY… stopping in North Platte, NE to see the world’s largest train yard. Otherwise, mostly a day of driving.
We woke up bright and early and packed up the car. Since the hotel offered a free continental breakfast, we decided to give it a try. This was probably the worst continental breakfast I’ve ever seen in a hotel. I tend to be pickier than the rest of the family when it comes to these, but even Pickle and Buddy couldn’t finish their “meals”. No biggie, Stephanie packed lots of snacks for the car ride, including granola bars and bagels (and a bunch of sweet and salty treats for later too.)
After the crummy breakfast, we hopped in the car and got a move on. I had anticipated a lot of, “Are we there yet’s” and “How much farther’s”, so I found a map online and printed a copy for each of the kids and one for the front passenger seat. It would serve two purposes: 1.) Everyone’s favorite license plate game. Check off the state the first time you see the corresponding license plate. 2.) I drew out the route showing the places where we’d stop for each night.
This turned out to be a great idea, because anytime someone asked how much further, I’d just point out where we were currently on the map. And of course, we all had fun looking out for new license plates. Unfortunately, we never saw all of them. We came up three states short. I don’t remember exactly, but they were all from the north east. Can’t believe we found Hawaii and Alaska, but not Connecticut. LOL.
Anyway, the morning was fairly uneventful. The most noteworthy thing was that it had been raining a lot up north and most of the creeks and streams that we passed were overflowing. Made for some interesting sites. Before we knew it, we had crossed into Iowa. This was the first time any of the kids had been in Iowa (for that matter, they had never been in Nebraska, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, and Oklahoma either. Ha!)
And not too much longer, we made it into Nebraska.
Similar to dinner the night before (Taco John’s), I wanted to keep lunch fast and cheap, but also try something different. I had heard about
Runza before, but never talked to anyone who’d ever had it. Here’s the description of what a runza sandwich is from their website:
“THE SANDWICH WE LIKE SO MUCH, WE NAMED THE RESTAURANT AFTER IT
Ground beef seasoned with a top-secret blend of spices and mixed with cabbage and onions. All wrapped up in fresh-baked bread. It’s the taste that generations of Midwesterners have grown up loving, and it’s our signature sandwich. Get it topped however you want – because while we make it fresh, you make it your own."
Sounded pretty interesting, so we decided to give it a try...
Stephanie and I both had runza sandwiches, the kids had burgers and chicken nuggets. How was it? Somewhere between OK and pretty good. I’d probably try it again the next time we drive through Nebraska, but I wouldn’t go out of my way for it.
The fries were pretty good. I love crinkle cut fries and these reminded me of Culver’s, so that’s a plus.
The other MAJOR plus in my book, is that they had self serve icee’s/slushies… which could be interchanged with any fountain drink option for free. Nice!
Using my best Forest Gump impersonation, “And that’s all I have to say about that…” Time to get back in the car.
An hour or two later, we made it to North Platte. Cool! This pit stop was mostly for Buddy, our big train fan.
We stopped at the
Golden Spike Tower, which is adjacent to Bailey Yard. It has museum exhibits on the first floor and viewing platforms on the top two floors. I think it was about 7 bucks per person to go inside. And then a $1 discount per ticket for having
AAA. Not too bad, and certainly worth it for a couple train fans.
So yeah, this is the world’s largest train yard. And pretty spectacular. They said that 10,000 train cars are managed there every day. Trains galore, and heaven for Buddy. He was super stoked!!
We browsed around the museum exhibits for a little while and then headed up to the viewing platforms. I took a lot of photos and videos inside and out, but trying to keep it relatively brief here. Here are a couple of shots from the top.
They had a retired Union Pacific train worker up on the top floor who was there to answer your questions. I didn’t have any problem showing my ignorance and I asked him a TON of questions about the various operations. I really learned a lot that day. Pretty fascinating stuff.
We probably spent 45 minutes watching the trains up from the top of the tower and then decided to come down and explore a little more and then hit the gift shop.
Buddy ended up getting a Union Pacific hat and t-shirt with his souvenir money.
Additionally, they had some amazing G gauge LGB model trains that ran up near the ceiling of the museum exhibit area. You had to deposit 50 cents into a machine to get them to run. Of course, we had to give it a try!!! We watched them run for a while. Super cool. If I had a lot of money, I’d build a backyard garden railroad using LGB trains (similar to what they have at the German Pavillon in EPCOT.)
After that, we explored outside for a little while, grabbed a couple more photos and decided to move on...
If you are ever traveling along I-80 in Nebraska, it’s worth a stop. Even Princess (teenage girl!!) enjoyed it… that’s saying something!
Stayed tuned for the next post as we explore North Platte a little more before we leaven, and run into our first happy accident
