Little Vacation in the Nebraska Sandhills and National Forest

I’m typing this from a picnic table in Keller State Park, while Larry and Victoria are fishing.  I’ve trekked all over the park taking photos, and if I don’t stop sometime soon, I’m going to be sorting and editing photos for the next 40 years.

It’s beautiful here, but my pictures would look better if the sky wasn’t gunmetal gray.  I just pulled out my binoculars – and I can tell Larry has been using them, because a) they are wedged into the too-tight quilted case upside down, and b) the strap is wrapped tightly around the middle.  Now, that looks nice and neat, as his cord/strap/rope jobs generally are; but when one is in a hurry to look at a passing boid, it ain’t so very handy, huh-uh, nosiree!

The birds are calling (as opposed to ‘singing’ and ‘warbling’, as they do in the spring) (well, the blue jays are doing more yelling than calling), insects are chirping and humming (and biting), and the Calamus River (just a baby, nothing more than a rushing stream, at this point in its life) is rushing and gurgling nearby.

A friend and I were talking about family members who injure themselves – and how they ‘fix’ themselves:  her son once used duct tape for a serious injury.  Larry used gorilla glue on a bad cut on his thumb.  

Dr. Luckey had to laugh... but told him it wouldn’t be good to get that stuff into one’s blood stream.

People on my mother’s side of the family were tough, when it came to pain.  My Grandpa Winings cut his thumb quite badly one day out in the field.  He tied it with a cloth, went to the house, boiled water, sterilized needle and thread, went out to the front porch, sat on the step, and sewed his thumb back together again.

Some days later, he showed it to the doctor, a friend of his.  The doctor always said Grandpa had done a neater job – left-handed – than he himself could have done.

Oh, and when Grandpa was done with his needlework, he went right back out into the field and got back to work.

My two Grandpas lived in adjoining counties in Illinois – and each had the largest farm in their respective county.  They both lost their farms during the depression – and both of them worked like dogs and got them back a few years later.

Grandpa Swiney died of a ruptured ulcer at age 49.  They’d thought it was appendicitis and removed his appendix.  Daddy said they always thought the loss of his farm, and his working day and night to get it back, contributed greatly to that ulcer.

Grandpa Winings moved with his family to North Dakota in 1936 or thereabouts – so Daddy and Mama married sooner than they’d intended (ages 19 and 18), so they wouldn’t have to part ways.  My Winings grandparents homesteaded west of Fargo, near the little town of Arthur, and were given a whole lot of extra acres because they hand-planted some 40,000 trees!

Oh! – look what I found:

My mother Hester is in the back row, third from the right.

Look what else I just found – I’ve heard this story, but not all of it, and not with as much detail.  Lura Winings was my maternal grandmother; Joicie Adkins my maternal great-grandmother.  I either never knew or did not remember that I had a great-great-grandmother named Sarah:

JOICIE ADKINS BACON

(by Lura Bacon Winings)

Joicie, 2nd daughter of Reuben Adkins and Sarah Rhodes Penniwell, was born on her father's farm 2 ½ miles north of Bethany, Illinois on May 12, 1863.  She attended Bushart School near the farm and later Sells Academy in Bethany.

Her teacher at the Bushart School was Charles Bacon, whom she later married.  He came to the community in 1881 after coming to Lake City with his father and brother Amos.  He may have taught school in Lake City, as he played cornet in the Lake City band.

His obituary says, "Mr. Bacon came into the neighborhood 8 years ago, an entire stranger, and engaged in school teaching.  He remained 2 years, making a good record as a teacher and many friends, and then went to Dakota to make a home.  Four years ago this month (June 1889), he returned to Illinois to claim as his bride Miss Joicie Adkins, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Reuben Adkins, and after a brief stay returned with her to his northern home.  Naturally ambitious, he did not spare himself, but worked hard on the farm in summer and teaching in the winter.  This added to exposure in the famous blizzard of two years ago (1886-87) and was too much for his frail constitution, and last November with his wife and child he came back to this neighborhood [Bethany, Illinois] hoping to regain his health.  His malady had proceeded too far, however, to be checked, and for several months he had no hope of recovery.  He was baptized and united with the Methodist Church.  He had a clear apprehension of Christ his Saviour and the last days of his life were peaceful and confident."  Quoted from the Bethany Echo.

I [Lura Bacon Winings] have an autograph album given by "C.A. Bacon to Joicie Adkins December 25, 1882, Columbia, Dakota Territory" written in his beautiful handwriting.  I also have other samples of his beautiful shaded penmanship.

Charles had gone to South Dakota (Dakota Territory then) with his brother Amos and wife and his father George Bacon.  He was not 21 years of age until June 22, 1882, and they would not lie about their age; so they were too late to get claims near Charles' father and brother Amos, and Frank's grandfather, Bartlett Bacon, and they had to take claims farther north on land that was more sandy.  Their farms were across the road from each other on what is now Highway 37.  The cousins and their wives were very close friends and much company for each other in this new country.

Charles made improvements on his land, a house and barn and taught school at Huffton.  The town of Huffton was built on land of his Uncle Bartlett and Charles' father gave land for the cemetery where he and Bartlett were buried.  Just south of Bartlett Bacon's quarter was the quarter taken by Amos and across the road (now 37) west was a quarter taken by Frank's father Robert Paine.

The school at Huffton was an ungraded school as were all schools there at that time.  I have my father's notebook with all pupils; records, recommendations for promotion, etc.  Also his farming plans, and a talk he gave before the county institute is written in his very beautiful handwriting.

Charles is buried in Bethany Cemetery and his daughter Ethel who died at 20 years of age is buried beside him.  His daughter Lura was born two months after he died.

Joicie always loved books and was generous to loan books, especially to young people.  The day of her funeral, a teenage girl expressed to some of the family her gratitude for books she borrowed before Bethany had a library.  In the early days there were few books available, and Joicie remembered her hunger for books and always loaned books, gave away magazines, etc.

Her home was always a welcome place for visiting relatives; she always was ready to help with church and family affairs and for many years was a recorder as well as a charter member of Royal Neighbors.

For many years she was a dressmaker.

Her last months held much suffering from cancer, but she never complained and was always thoughtful of those around her.  Her life was one of love and kindness.  After Charles' death, she remained a widow over 15 years and busily and bravely made a wonderful home for her girls.

I have a picture of my Great-grandfather and Great-grandmother Charles and Joicie Bacon, a very nice-looking couple, on their wedding day.  Joicie is wearing a beautiful dress that she made herself, entirely by hand.  The 12” flounce at the bottom of the wide, floor-length skirt consists of very narrow knife pleats, as is the bodice and the sleeves down to the long, tight cuffs.  The whole dress is a study in exquisite perfection.  And it’s all done by hand!

Some of Mama’s family didn’t treat Daddy very well.  Joicie, Mama’s beloved ‘Grandmother Russ’ (her second husband’s name), however, treated him with love and kindness, just as it reads above – and he appreciated and loved her in return. 

Many years later, he would say that she was instrumental in causing him to turn to Christ.  He believed she truly was a Christian – that is, born again, a believer.  And just look – it says her first husband, who died just before my Grandma Lura Winings was born, was also born again.

One or two loving souls in a family can make a difference, can’t they?  Even for an in-law!  There are more stories of my ancestors here:  The Adkins Family of Wicomico.  I enjoy reading about the lives of those gone before, and wish there were more details.  It is all so very interesting to me.  But there was certainly a lot of tragedy in days gone by, wasn’t there?

Tuesday morning, I found a deceased mouse in the electrocution trap in one of the large drawers in the washroom.  He’d been there two – maybe even three – days. 

AAAAAaauuuuuuuuuggggggggghhhhhh!!!  I’d been checking that thing regularly, every single day, for a couple of weeks.  Nothing.  And then, wouldn’t you know, the two or three days I forgot, a mouse tramps right in and perishes.

He smelled.  Or at least, what was left of him smelled. 

This, I cannot abide.  I like things clean, and smelling good!  Sooo...  I cleaned everything.  I washed all the dishtowels and dishcloths in that drawer, and then, finding mouse tracks in the other drawer, washed everything in that drawer, too, and then thoroughly cleaned the drawers.

These are huge old drawers, and they were plumb full of towels and cloths.  It took six laundry loads to get them all washed.  Only two or three of those loads could be hung out on the clothesline, as it was raining the rest of the time.

Then a trivet got put into the dryer accidentally (the maid did it when I wasn’t looking) – one of those that is stuffed with sawdust. 

It came unstuffed.

Aarrggghhh.  But... better sawdust than, oh, say, emery or something equally abrasive.  So nothing was harmed.

Larry vacuumed the dryer out for me when he got home, as the vacuum was upstairs near Victoria’s room, and some days it’s too heavy for me to tote down the stairs.  Not because the weight of the vacuum fluctuates so much, but because my toting capacity fluctuates.  Besides, I had the flu.  Or something.  (I planned on a miraculous recovery just in time for our planned little vacation to the Sandhills on Thursday.)

I hung the next load outside, having to overlap everything, since there isn’t a whole lot of line.  I sprayed the drawer... wiped it out... sprayed it again...  After which, the combination of Murphy’s (moldy) soap (didn’t notice the mold until I’d sprayed, and the straw does draw from the bottom, fortunately) and Essence Eau de Mouse Nest made me feel like gagging.  Especially since I already felt like gagging.  I finally pulled the drawers entirely out of the cupboard, sprayed them with some good wood cleaner, put them on the deck, too, and let them dry and air out in the sun all day.

Then I marched back inside and consoled myself by paying bills and uploading some things to my blog.  (One is in a bad way, when paying the bills is a consolation.)

Wednesday, I finished washing the gazillion dishtowels and dishcloths while working on the Amazing Grace quilt. 

By early afternoon, all the cloths and towels were washed and dried.  One load was in a basket needing to be folded... one load was on the clothesline needing to be folded... another load was in the dryer needing to be folded... a load of Larry’s workclothes was in the washer needing to be dried... and another load of Larry’s workclothes was in the hamper needing to be washed.  There was one more load of Victoria’s and my clothes after that, and then everything would be washed.  That sounds like a lot; but it seems somewhat minor, to one who used to wash clothes for eleven people.  The older children helped, thankfully.

Dr. Luckey decided to put Lawrence in the hospital that day, as he was having troubles with kidney failure.  He’d fallen Tuesday evening, hitting his chin.

Thursday morning, I turned the furnace on for 15 minutes or so, just to take the morning chill off – first time to use the heat this season.

I spent late morning/early afternoon packing and cleaning the house.  Cleaning, because I don’t want those who care for the cats and the fish to walk into a pigsty, and neither do I want to walk into one when we return from our trip.  By 3:30 p.m., I had everything packed even Larry’s one sock.  (That's all he thinks he needs, no matter where we go or how long we're going to be there – ’cuz, after all, if he should happen to step in a puddle, he’s quick-witted and has good enough reflexes to avoid stepping in it with the other foot, now, isn’t he??)

Anyway, I had packed his things, my things, and some food, drink, and eating utensils; the bathroom and kitchen were cleaned, and the rugs were vacuumed.  Victoria got home from work at 4:00, expecting to leave promptly.  Larry’s business, however, was taking longer than expected.  Despite getting up at 5:30 a.m. and working on four-wheelers all day, he was just washing up and changing jeans and shirt at 5:30 p.m. 

Meanwhile, Victoria was snorting around, because she wanted to go.  She snorts quite grandly.

We left home at about 6:00 p.m. – and wound up pulling onto Rte. 22, at the bottom of the hill, right behind Loren, who was heading for the Genoa Headgates with his pickup and trailer, planning to stay overnight.  We learnt this when he called a little later.  He wanted to make sure the furnace, water heater, etc., in his camper work properly in cooler weather, so that he can safely take it somewhere farther from home sometime in the future.  While he talked to me on the phone, a train whistle suddenly blared, and he laughed, “Uh-oh.  Seems like I’m parked right next to the tracks.”

Norma called to tell me that Lawrence was out of the hospital and home again.  The doctor, suspecting an infection, gave him a prescription for antibiotics.  Norma got him a walker so he won’t fall again. 

By shortly after 10:00 p.m., we were in our motel room in Halsey, Nebraska – and now we knew why it was only 50 buckaroos.

Victoria, looking around, announced, “I’m glad I packed plenty of clothes, because I can see there’s not going to be a laundromat here.”  She peered across the street, spotted a small post office, and added, “I could go over there and use their teakettle, I guess.”  :-D

Online, I had read the amenities of the room:  ‘Table and two comfortable chairs.’

The table is a tall butcher’s block.  Or maybe a small section of a bar counter.  The ‘chair’ in front of it is a rolling heater with a folded blanket on it.  There’s another similar heater in the room – evidently they’re the only heat source.

Over by the front door (with the paint slopped down the front of it, and the mismatched, badly cut cedar trim, which is beautiful enough on its own that it’s a cryin’ shame that someone mutilated it thusly), there is an antiquated metal folding chair.  I suppose it could be considered ‘comfortable’, if you compare it with the seating plank in a buckboard.  In the opposite corner (I was going to say ‘far corner’, but that would be a total misconstruing of the word ‘far’, since the room is only about 12’ square, plus the dinky corner where I am sitting at the bar counter trying to type on my laptop, which is above elbow-height) sits a chair that I imagine was what they were thinking of when they said ‘comfortable’, as it is, in fact, slightly padded vinyl, both seat and back, with skinny wooden arms, the type of chair one might have found in a dentist’s waiting room, circa 1950.  The laptop is plugged into an outlet under the table – and the outlet cover is lying on the floor.  (I didn’t do it; it was already that way.)

The air conditioner looks to have been stuck willy-nilly into the wall, and the wood framing around it has been left unfinished and uncovered by Sheetrock or plaster.  The surprising thing is that it doesn’t tumble right on out of the wall when one of the many passing coal trains shakes and rattles the place.

The most incongruous feature in the entire room is the deep-set octagonal window just to my left, framed in glistening cedar – and the stained glass is in French panes.  Inside the double glass hangs an oval glass suncatcher with the word ‘Welcome’ in the middle.

However, on the floor beneath it lies a small heap of dead bugs and a bit of dirt.  :-P

The door key, the lady told Larry, is new, and doesn’t work well.  She was telling the truth, at least about the latter.

He fiddled with it for five minutes before he finally got the door open.  This could get old.

We, too, are right next to the tracks – and the trains come barreling through often.  In the first hour and a half after we got there, I think five trains came through, announcing themselves loudly each time.  That was nothing in comparison to the rate at which they passed through during daylight hours.

There was no tub, but at least the shower was nicely tiled.  The edge of the wall was unfinished... the wall behind the light switch was unfinished... and there were no towel rods or rings or hooks, but only a shelf on which a few clean towels and washcloths were stacked.

There was, however, something you don’t see in just any ol’ motel room:  a broom with a long-handled dustpan.  They expect you to keep your room clean, I tell you, keep it clean!!!

The bathroom door looked like they found it at the Surplus and Seconds Building Materials Warehouse (in the ‘seconds’ section, not the ‘surplus’ department).  Furthermore, it didn’t fit into the frame.  If you’re determined (and tough), you can shove it against the jamb hard enough that it might stay stuck until you are ready to come out again.  Lacking that, it will simply be swinging open, ready for your exit when you are.  If you push it clear shut, good and hard, you might not get back out again.

Bald Eagle

The inside of the door was painted cream.  No, I take that back – it was sour cream.  The overhead jamb matched it.  The right jamb was painted white.  Sort of white.  They only put one coat on it, and the wood stain showed through.  The left jamb had been left dark brown wood-stain color, matching the outside of the door.  BUT! – the outer trim was that beautiful cedar again!  The miters weren’t perfect, but the wood was beautiful, nonetheless.  There was cedar trim around the front window, too, and the maroon curtains were sort of pretty.

There was a refrigerator in the room, just as advertised.  It was no more than 18” x 18” – which meant it was taking up an eighth of the floor space.  The two heaters together were taking up a fourth of the floor space.  (If I kept figuring things that way, we would soon have nowhere to put our feet but in the beds or on the butcher’s block.)

Victoria had her choice of the lower or the upper full-sized bunk.  She chose the bottom – and nearly sat on a buffalo bur.  Then she bumped her head on the metal upper frame.  The room could conceivably sleep six – though if they were all up and moving about at the same time and someone tripped, they’d all go down like dominoes, plunk-plunk-plunk-plunk-plunk-plunk.

The butcher’s block at which I was sitting had inlaid tiles – but instead of grout between the tiles, it had dirt.  “I should wedge a few dandelion seeds in there,” I told Victoria, “so that the next visitor can have blooming plants on his table.”  :-D

The bed creaked and groaned somethin’ fierce when Larry crawled in.

“Is there going to be anything left for me to sleep on?” I asked.  (I will give them credit for clean bedding and comfortable mattresses, despite the noisy springs.)

We were right on the highway.  Trucks went by more often than trains.  Trucks, I don’t mind.  In fact, the noise of a truck passing by on the highway makes me want to go somewhere.  Old memories of travel from when I was a wee little kiddo.

But then a noisy pickup went by and made the front window vibrate loudly enough to sound like a gigantic, angry wasp. 

{The next couple of pages are straight out of my journal, in present tense (because copy-and-paste is easier than redoing all my scribblings into past tense, and it’s late and I’m sleepy)}:

Oh!  I just spotted another rusty old metal folding chair leaning against the wall next to the bathroom.  How ’bout that.  Seating for us all!  (The crowd cheers wildly.)

Our cell phones work sporadically or not at all – and the promised ‘free wi-fi’ is evidently at the other end of this eleven-room motel.  There is a phone in the room, just as promised online – one of those old squarish ‘Dial-9-to-get-out’ things.  The kind whose receiver can rest between your shoulder and your ear – and you don’t even have to tip your head more than 10° to keep it there.

Somewhere in the joint, there is a Coffee Lounge and a Hot Tub.  The description online almost makes it sound as if the Hot Tub is right there in the Coffee Lounge, stage center.  That is, ah, disturbing.  Guess we’ll find out, in the morning.

There is free breakfast! 

Grits?  Gopher gravy on muskrat and biscuits?

The Ritz, this is not.

It’s not even Motel 6!  (And the light was not on.)  (Actually, it’s burnt out.)

Since Victoria has Monday off, Larry is planning to ask Charles if he can take the day off, too, and we will extend our little vacation to Monday evening.  But tomorrow I’m going to find out if we can get our money back for tomorrow night, and move to a motel in Thedford, 17 miles to the west, where there are better accommodations.  To think there is a lovely ranch house, the whole house, halfway in between these two villages, that can be rented for only $109 a night!!

Okay, it’s my turn in the shower.  Did I say it was nicely tiled?!  There’s mold between the tiles!  Or maybe it’s just black dirt.  Nebraska soil is rich.

We’ll call it black dirt, and I’ll plant dandelion seeds in it.  Or winter wheat.  Tomorrow.

At least the bathroom fan is harmonic.  It’s singing a tune right n-------- 

Well, maybe not.  It’s shrieking and squealing, more like. 

I’d better hurry and get that thing turned back off again before it burns the place down!

Though that might be an improvement.

The toilet is not firmly screwed to the floor.  Or maybe the floor is not firmly screwed to the ground.  Something isn’t firmly screwed to something.  Unless there’s a fault line directly under the village of Halsey (population 90), and we’ve just had a temblor. 

Another problem, this one of my own making:  I brought only long-sleeved pajamas, because, after all, the temperature was supposed to be in the low 50s – high 40s.  And so it is.

But not in this room.

In here, it’s 110° in the shade.

Well, maybe I’ll cool down shortly.  I could open the window, but the noise of the trains would be even more mind-numbingly deafening than it already is.  Or I could turn on the air conditioner.  I asked Victoria if she thought the wall in which the air conditioner precariously rests was the other side of someone else’s room, or an outer room.

“Well, I don’t suppose they would stick the back of the air conditioner into someone else’s room,” she surmised.

“Unless one side is fake,” I suggested, “with pretend buttons and dials.  People push and turn them, it makes noise, and they imagine themselves cooler.”

There goes another train.  It’s 1:12 a.m.  I think I’ll leave the squalling fan on in the bathroom, the better to drown out the trains.  It’s doing a right good competition!

One of these days before I go toenails up, I’m going to book me a room at the Ritz.  Just to counteract this one.

But... the shower was hot and sprayed fairly well... I had my very own soap, shampoo, conditioner, Noxzema, ‘Cherish the Moment’ body crème (haha!), and ‘Fraîcheur Matinale’ (i.e., ‘Morning Fresh’) powder, with parfum de lavande (i.e., lavender).  And I made sure to wash off each foot and then step out without retouching the shower tile, the better to leave the black, rich soil behind.

The Verizon cell signal blinks on now and then, so I was actually able to look up the population of Thedford on my laptop (204)... the French Vanilla Cream coffee was still piping hot (and I still have one more thermos full for morning)...

It’s 1:22 a.m., and I still can’t tell you what the temperature is, because evidently the little man who lives in the nearest Verizon cell phone tower and plays roulette with the signal has turned it off completely and gone fast asleep.

Sooo... I’m off to the Land of Nod!

Or at least to the squeaking, groaning bed.  Thank goodness, I brought my own pillows!

*** Now it is Friday, October 02.  It’s almost 8:30 a.m.  We need to move out of this little two-bit motel to a better one 17 miles west.  Or, at least I think we do.  Larry is unconcerned; he just wants to ride his four-wheeler!  Victoria is still sound asleep.  

This morning I had only just barely fallen asleep when Larry’s alarm on his phone went off a little after 5:00 a.m.; he’d forgotten to turn it off.  Then I was awake again for a while... finally started drifting off – and Victoria’s iPad alarm went off.  It was, oh, maybe 6:45 a.m.?  She had forgotten to turn it off.  Half an hour later I fell asleep... and then Larry got up and that woke me up.  A couple of hours’ sleep is not quite enough.  I was hoping my eyes would get all nicely rested up on this trip!  So far, not so much.  At least it’s not sunny; that makes matters worse. 

There’s a train track very nearby, and trains were busy all through the night.  Trucks pass by mere yards from the front door, and they don’t have to slow much as they go through this village, with a population of 90.  Thedford is over double the size, at 204 – a real bustling burg!

Somewhere in this eleven-room motel, there’s supposed to be a coffee lounge and free breakfast.  I’m going to finish curling my hair and go look for it.  Do I look hungry to you??

Twenty minutes later:  Larry and I are ready for... something.  Victoria is getting ready.  She pulled on a towel hanging over the shower rod... and down it came.  Rod and all.

Larry is trying to put it back up...  and now the curtain has slid completely off the rod, and the ends have fallen off the rod.

Larry, with a longsuffering sigh:  “Well, what makes the blame thing tick.”

Larry went to get coffee in the ‘Coffee Lounge’ (overly descriptive moniker for a small room with dying Dieffenbachia (yes, one of those – those dreadful things that spray Victoria in the eye) and peace lilies and UNFOs (Unidentified Non-Flowering Objects), two steps up to an Out-Of-Order Hot Tub (thankfully ‘out of order’ – who wants to eat breakfast and drink coffee in a small room with large people in scanty attire splish-splashing about just a couple of feet away?!) (I can say ‘large people’ and run a good chance of being correct these days, since the majority of the population is large now)... but there was no more coffee in the pot (though he could have made more, we saw later, upon spotting the can of coffee grounds, which may or may not have been ground in this century).  A lady who had just poured the last of it into a couple of cups for herself and a friend very nicely gave him her cup and said she and her friend would share.

He generously brought the cup back to share with me – but I was not very appreciative, on account of the fact that I don’t eat swamp mud, as a general rule, and particularly not before breakfast.

We opened the door to go out – and there were three mule deer – all bucks – just across the road.  They were gone by the time I whirled around and grabbed my camera.

We went back to the small, mildewy ‘coffee lounge’ to see if we could scrounge up some breakfast.  There were half a dozen small boxes of cold cereal and three packets of instant oatmeal – and in the refrigerator (small, but twice as big as the one in the room) was a large basket of butter packets, half a loaf of bread, and half a jug of milk which looked to be coagulating into butter or cottage cheese along the insides of said jug.

I gingerly removed the lid and took a small whiff.

After I got back up off the floor, I wheezed and croaked to Larry, “Could you get our milk from the refrigerator in our room, please?”

He got it... and I made myself some apple-cinnamon oatmeal in a small Styrofoam bowl that was so thin it cracked every time I picked it up and tried to move it.  The dinky little plastic spoons were dirty and sticky.  We washed them, dried them on napkins that smelled like they’d been in a greasy-food joint, and ate.  Victoria had corn pops, and complained bitterly over the skim milk.

{Okay, back to past tense...}

By 10:20 a.m., we were in the Nebraska Sandhills town of Thedford, booking a room in a nice and decent motel.  (No, not the Cowpoke Hotel, built in 1914 – I think only ghosts stay there these days.)  Victoria and I walked in and looked around; it was nice.  Normal.  We will not again begrudge a normal motel room.  We don’t need the Ritz, we just need normal.

There was a cleaning cart and cleaning ladies working some distance down the hall.  Victoria pointed and said, “It’s so comforting just to see a cleaning cart.  They’ve never heard of such a thing, at the Frontier Inn!”

Then we headed off to play in the Nebraska National Forest.  We hadn’t gotten away from those ear-splitting trains, though.  We were just pulling out of the parking lot when yet another of the never-ending coal trains, this one empty, went roaring by, heading west.  They get coal in Wyoming and bring it back; Nebraska has a lot of coal plants.

We drove into the Nebraska National Forest from the northwest, continued on a ways until the road was not much more than a dirt and sand goat path, and then Larry unloaded the four-wheelers off the trailer.  Larry and Victoria rode away, and I went back to the Frontier Inn in Halsey and gathered up all our stuff (except for Larry’s phone charge cord, which I missed, since he had it wrapped so neatly atop the air conditioner).

Then I came back to the Nebraska National Forest, northeast entrance, and met Larry and Victoria by the Bessey Ranger Station.  They decided to go riding again for an hour on the Dismal Trail by the Dismal River; I stayed with the Jeep.  It started sprinkling – and now and then it thundered good and loud.  They had rain ponchos, so they wouldn’t get soaked.  

Before heading off, Larry made reservations for Sunday night in Long Pine, getting one of the cabins near the one where we stayed the Friday night before Easter when we were on the way to South Dakota.  He asked for the one with a deck above the arroyo. 

I had pictures to edit and some hideous coffee to drink.  We’d run out of the coffee from home, and hadn’t taken time to make more that morning – and I forgot twist-ties to tie shut the filter so I could drop it into the coffeepot (a cute little gadget that boils water – I think Daddy and Mama got it at the Airstream sales store years ago).  I had embroidery, too – but, as it turned out, I never even unzipped the case. 

There were marigolds blooming in a square planter nearby.  I hopped out of the Jeep during a lull in the rain and took some pictures of them – and found a teardrop-shaped green beetle with black spots.  Turns out, it’s a spotted cucumber beetle – a pest.  A few yellow cottonwood leaves were starting to fall, although many of the trees are still green.

By 2:30 p.m., I was hungry, so I chowed down on the Multi-Grain Keebler Club crackers Loren had given us before we left, along with a piece of Pepper Jack string cheese.

When the four-wheelin’ kids had had their fill of four-wheelin’, they loaded the ATVs back onto the trailer, and we took a one-and-a-half-hour drive right through the heart of the forest.  It really was pretty.  We saw deer, birds galore, and pronghorn antelope, including a skittish herd of nine.  They ran when we stopped to take photos, even though they were a very long ways away.  But antelope are so curious, they can’t stand to run for long before they have to circle and look back to see if you’re still where they left you, and what you’re doing now.

One of the roads we took was clearly once a main thoroughfare, as there are still painted stripes visible here and there on it.  But we didn’t see another solitary vehicle on the road in the hour and a half we were on it.

The cattle way out in the boonies – especially the youngsters – are a whole lot more curious about passersby than cattle along well-traveled byways.

We returned to the motel, unhitched the trailer, then went to eat supper in Mullen, 25 miles to the west (and in Mountain Daylight Time, which makes me feel like I should continue on to the mountains), at Big Red’s Café.  I got chicken noodle soup and a chef salad, with blueberry pie ala mode for dessert.  Larry got a humongous ribeye steak, baked potato, lettuce, and a dinner roll.  Victoria had chicken fried steak (not too awfully flavorful until she slathered it with ketchup), onion rings, lettuce.  I shared my soup with Victoria, my salad with Larry, and had a few bites of their meat.  I got full when there were two small bites of blueberry pie left, so I gave them to Larry.  I’m generous like that.

The menus had the interesting story of Mullen on the front and back covers.  Back in 1917, driving the road (called a ‘trail road’ or a ‘pasture road’) between Mullen and Valentine, though only 91 miles long, required the opening and closing of 119 gates or fences.

Our motel in Thedford had a nice little refrigerator and a good microwave.  Trouble was, I hadn’t brought a microwavable cup for coffee.  This is a dire strait to be in.  In which to be.  English, bah.  Anyway, I noticed some white ceramic mugs holding pens, candy sticks, etc., on the counter in Big Red’s.  They had black cows and calves etched on the sides.

So when we paid for our food, I asked the lady if she ever sold any of those mugs (gesturing down the counter toward the white and black cow/calf mugs). 

She smiled, “Sure!  Let me go get a new one for you.”

She came out, after some rummaging around, with a black cup with ads for every business in town printed in gold all the way around.

Well, it wasn’t what I’d asked for or envisioned; but I decided, Oh, well; it’ll be a nice keepsake.

Now I suddenly notice:  The ad for Big Red’s says “BIG RED’S CAFÉ & LOUNGE – A (bleep) of a Place to Eat.” 

Well.  Isn’t that just charming.  Guess I won’t be giving it away for Christmas.

{Why can I never hit a happy medium with the temperature in the motel room??!  I’m hot!  I’m cold!  I’m boiling!  I’m freezing!  I’m roasted!  I’m frozen solid!  I’m steaming!  I’m iced-over!  (It couldn’t possibly have anything to do with the way I swing the thermostat far one way and then far the other, or throw open the window wide, and then close it tight.  Could it?)}

Saturday, Larry and Victoria took the kayaks a ways down the Middle Loup River.  It was Victoria’s first time kayaking on her own.  They’d barely begun when she, in her haste to take off, sailed directly into a large snag – part of a fallen tree – and was stuck fast.  Fortunately, Larry came steaming to her rescue, lifting part of the branch, and directing her on oar strategy and suchlike.  She leaned back in her kayak so as to safely pass underneath, and was off again.  Larry maneuvered his craft around the protruding branch, and was soon catching up with his daughter.  The current is quick in that river; one can drift, if one prefers, and merely steer.

They saw quite a few whitetail deer, ducks, a big snapping turtle, and a Sandhill crane flying over.  (Actually, only the Sandhill crane was flying over; the rest were a) on the banks of the river, b) swimming, and c) standing on a sandbar with his feet in the water, respectively.)  (The ‘respectively’ refers to the menagerie, not the feet.)

(Tsk.  English.  Such troubles.)

It was only about 51° – but at least it didn’t rain.  Their sweaters, lifejackets, hats, gloves, and the exertion kept them nicely warm.

I picked them up an hour and a half later – just three miles down the road.  However, the river itself makes many deep bends and half-loops, so was many times longer than the road.

That evening, we had a Facetime visit with Lydia and Jonathan, and then Jeremy and Jacob came along and chatted with us, too.  Victoria was playing peek-a-boo with Jonathan, turning the iPad this way and that so she disappeared, then reappeared, which made him laugh uproariously.  When she paused the game in order to visit with her sister, Jonathan tried to ‘scroll’ her one way and another.  Hee hee  Funny almost-tech-savvy little kid.

We stayed in the motel in Thedford again Saturday night.  It’s a nice motel, and they have free breakfasts, too.  Their milk is never sour – because they don’t offer any milk, at all!  Bah, humbug.  How can it be a breakfast, without milk, I ask you?!

We watched our Sunday School service on Victoria’s iPhone while sitting in the breakfast lobby at the motel, with nary another soul around.  I was looking at the big-screen TV, watching news about the terrible flooding in South Carolina, when it occurred to me that the voice on the iPhone sounded mighty familiar.  Sure enough, it was Robert.

We couldn’t listen to the main service, because we had to be out of the motel shortly, and our route took us through areas where there was no cell phone service.  But we can watch it later, since the sermons are posted online.

Having been deprived of milk with breakfast, I bought myself a bottle of chocolate milk at the very first stop that morning, and glugged down the entire works as fast as I could chug it.  Or maybe I chugged it down as fast as I could glug it.

Before leaving Nebraska National Forest, we went to see the Scott Fire Tower.  We climbed up to the observation deck – 70 steps to the top.  Quite a view, from up there!

When we went through Halsey, we stopped at the Frontier Inn to retrieve Larry’s forgotten phone cord and ask about a refund.  Larry wanted me to ask... I wanted him to...  I won.  He went and asked.  In his charming way, of course – “I wanted to be a little closer to the side of the forest where I intended to hunt,” practically stubbing his toe against the ground like a bashful schoolboy.  The lady assured him that she would remove the charge just as soon as she did the books that evening.

See, I was right to make him do the dirty work!  I would’ve said, “By the way, your milk has turned into bad cottage cheese, and doesn’t taste a bit good on the ancient oatmeal,” hurt the lady’s feelings, and caused her to charge us an extra fee for Cheese Embarrassment.

We turned north toward Long Pine, which is 35 miles south of the South Dakota border.  Stopping at a grocery store in Ainsworth, 10 miles west of Long Pine, Larry got all the stuff he needed to grill bacon-wrapped filet of beef, and potatoes.  Almost all the stuff.  We bought salad and various other things, too, including ingredients for pancakes and eggs in the morning.  We even found blueberry syrup.

Our cabin had a grill on the back deck, just outside the patio doors.  It was a lovely little cabin, tucked in the hilly pine forest in the north central part of the state, and it’s sooo nice... why didn’t we just come here in the first place?!  But of course we have to go where those among us can squirrel around with four-wheelers, kayak down a river (though that could be done around Long Pine, too, on Willow Creek or Long Pine Creek), and hunt in Nebraska National Forest.  Victoria discovered a volleyball net down in the valley below the cabin, and wants to take all her friends there to play with her.

She first tried getting there straight down a short flight of steps off the back deck, got stalled out at a short cliff, then spotted the trail a little distance away.  She clambered back up, headed for the trail, went down it.  I missed her descent, having gone back into the cabin to take more pictures.  I walked to edge of the deck to take a picture of her down in the valley below.  She called up to me, “I feel like the Man from Snowy River!”  (Old story, in which a man rides a mountain pony down a steep, steep side of a cliff, shale flying out from under the pony’s hooves.)

There were chickadees ‘dee-dee-deeing’ outside... a Northern flicker calling... a hawk making its high-pitched cry...

The owners came to greet us as we drove in.  The man shortly brought a folding bamboo room divider, some charcoal and lighter fluid, and a couple of his very own fishing rods for us to borrow.  His big old friendly golden Lab, Sophie, came too, and peered beseechingly in the door at me until I went and gave her a piece of cracker.

Larry prepared to grill the filets and potatoes – and discovered he had forgotten aluminum foil.  So back to Ainsworth he went, after first verifying that there was no place in the dinky berg of Long Pine that sold such a thing.

I had just remarked that I didn't have any good shoes for hiking around, and the sole was parting with the vamp on the only shoes I did have along.  So I was reduced to sandalwear, and that isn’t quite right for hiking in the woods.

Larry suggested I borrow Victoria’s tennis shoes, since she was wearing boots.  I laughed and said that wouldn’t work so well, since I wear size 6 ½ and she wears size 9 ½.  Now, the truth is, I wear a 6 ¾, but one has to go directly to Italy to get that size.  I said 6 ½ in order to exaggerate the difference between Victoria’s shoes and mine. 

Exaggeration has its drawbacks.  I discovered this fact half an hour later when Larry returned from the Shopko in Ainsworth with not only aluminum foil, but also a pair of lovely (and bright) tennis shoes – in a size 6 ½. 

“Uh-oh,” I said.

“What?” asked Larry.  “I got the size you said you wear!”

“Yeah, but...”

I tried them on.  Very comfortable.  But a mere smidge too short.  So I didn’t wear them that night, but saved them until the next day, when we could return them for a size seven.  There were lots of shoes to pick from, but I wanted some exactly like the ones Larry had picked out the night before, just because Larry had picked them out, and he never does that, so that made them special, don't you know.

Meanwhile, I opened all the blinds, the better to watch all the birds and the squirrels in the woods round about, sat down at the table, poured a cup of French Vanilla Crème coffee, and worked on pictures.  It was chilly and a bit rainy – and I had a lovely little cabin in which to snuggly sit and edit photos.  It smelled good, indoors and out. 

A nuthatch landed on a tree out back (smack on the trunk, as they do) and went spiraling headfirst down the trunk, uttering his funny little nasal ‘ank-ank-ank’.

This morning, Larry headed off somewhere at 0:dark-thirty, compound bow in hand.  He saw no deer, but the river looked inviting.  So back he came after a couple of hours to exchange the bow for the fishing rod.  He then saw ten deer, and caught no fish.

I set the coffeemaker to gurgling away.  When Larry came back, he cooked pancakes and eggs.  Victoria offered us some of her dill-flavored sunflower seeds.  Larry accepted; I declined.

They each put several in their mouths... chewed... sorted... spit out hulls...

Victoria, watching her father, laughed, “People look funny when they have sunflower seeds in their mouths!  That concentrated expression makes them look like they are doing long division in their heads.”

This afternoon, we went to Keller State Park.  We stopped at Shopko on the way to exchange the shoes for a size 7.  So now I have a very comfortable pair of the brightest fuchsia tennis shoes I ever saw in my life that are slightly less than a mere smidge too big.  But I put on warm socks, tied the laces, and, just to tell you how comfortable they are, I actually forgot to take them off when we got back to our cabin after traipsing about the park.  That’s unheard of.  I’m generally kicking shoes off the very moment I walk in the door.  Shoes make my feet hurt!  Except for these very comfortable, brightest fuchsia tennis shoes I ever saw in my life.  Furthermore, the tops and sides are a soft mesh, so feet won't sweat.  $50 shoes on sale for $30.  Pretty good deal, eh?  I never buy myself such expensive shoes.  I got four pairs of dressy knee socks and four pairs of bright fuzzy, warm socks, too.

Back in the Jeep, Larry downloaded fishing licenses for himself and for Victoria.  “Don’t want to forget this!” he remarked.

“No,” Victoria agreed, “A State Park is not the place to risk the wrath of the rangers!”  (pause)  Then she added, “Sentences like that make me proud of myself.”  :-D

At the park, Larry and Victoria fished, and I trekked about taking pictures.  After a couple of hours, I sat down at a picnic bench to work on my journal, swat all manner of biting insects, download pictures, swat insects, take selfies (with a Rebel T5i Canon and a tripod), and swat bugs.  The worst are those nasty little teensy weensy black gnat-like guerillabugs.  Those things have chainsaws for mandibles.

Victoria caught a rainbow trout, and from the commotion I saw in the fisherpersons’ vicinity later, I hazarded a guess that they’d caught several more.

There were blue jays, robins, Northern flickers, chickadees, nuthatches, brown thrashers, and various other birds of indeterminate lineage.

An old man – a real fisherman, as Larry said – came with fly-fishing gear, sporting a fisherman’s vest and a pipe as big as a trombone.  In 15 minutes, he caught his quota – what Larry and Victoria caught in two hours.

After leaving the State Park, we stopped at an archery range so Larry could decock his crossbow by firing it into one of the targets.  He asked Victoria, “Want to shoot it?”

“Sure!” she responded, always game for a new adventure.

We walked to the shooting range... Larry showed her what to do... she prepared... pulled the trigger... and shot the deer diagram dead center, right through the heart.

"How far away was it?" she asked later.

"Ten feet," answered Larry at the precise moment I replied, "A quarter of a mile."  haha

We went back to the cabin – the owners generously told us to stay as long as we wished that day – and Larry cleaned the fish.  He and Victoria had caught eight rainbow trout and released two.  We considered eating them there, but it was getting late, so he put them into the cooler.  (Besides, the owners were nice enough to let us stay throughout the day with no extra charge; we didn’t want our last hurrah to be leaving them with a cabin that reeked of fish.) 

We’ll have them tomorrow evening.  (The fish, not the cabin owners.)

We drove into the town of Basset, planning to eat at the restaurant, but it was already closed.  We headed for Atkinson.  It’s hard to find a place to eat (or fill with gas) after dark, out there in the boonies!

We wound up eating in O’Neill at a nice little restaurant where they gave us enough food to fill up the Russian Army and still have a dozen basketfuls left over.

Home by 11:30 p.m., I had everything put away and two loads of clothes washed by 1:30 a.m.

See more photos from our trip in previous posts – and soon a more recent post, when I finish editing today's shots.

Teensy must’ve gotten in a fight; he has an infected sore in the vicinity of his left ear.  Fortunately, I had some feline Amoxicillin in the refrigerator.  That old guy needs to start staying out of fights with younger, tougher stray toms!

We don’t know how old Teensy is, but I’d guess at least 12.  He has a few gray hairs around his muzzle now, and he walks a little more gimpily than he used to.  Tabby is at least 17 – but he still acts like a young spring chicken.

Here is Teensy, hovering like a vulture, waiting ’til Tabby is full of his soft food in the hopes that he can rush in and gobble up some of it before I snatch it up and put it away.  Note those crossed paws.  That’s his ‘Totally Innocent and Relaxed’ look, as if he would never dream of trying to grab Tabby’s food.  (Note, too, that Tabby isn’t buying it.)  Sometimes Teensy strrretches out just a leeeeeeetle bit farther – snags a chunk of food, and drags it right off the saucer and into his mouth.

I need to get back to Caleb and Maria’s quilt – and then I think I’ll make the Pine Valley Cabin owners matching placemats or miniature wall hangings with scenes of their cabins on them.

,,,>^..^<,,,     Sarah Lynn     ,,,>^..^<,,,