2018 - I think it was Ainsworth, Nebraska

 Rt. 20 is a great 2 lane road through Nebraska and I was on my way home from the Rocky Mountain Loop that I did.  In 2014, I passed through on this road and enjoyed the small towns, all of which had a Mom & PoP restaurant, gas station, John Deere Tractor and maybe a church.  If the small town was big enough it might have a Dairy Queen.  Dining on the road had changed!  And not for the better.  I stopped in this small town for a cup of coffee and had eaten at the diner there on past trips through.  Well, pretty much a ghost town, no diner, many businesses closed just a gas station coffee shop.

I stopped for coffee and someone older than myself joined me for coffee.  So I asked what happened to the town.  He and his brother live in the old family farm outside of town.  He said that the Co-Ops came in and bought all the flat farms and the people cashed out.  In the spring the big rigs came in with huge equipment and plowed, tilled and planted in a day and then left.  In the fall they came through and harvested and left.  Maybe occasionally a single truck would come in to monitor things but no one stayed there to eat or sleep.  So everything died!  I asked why he didn't sell.  He said that the family farm had a stream through it and the Co-Ops didn't want that land because it was a problem for the equipment.  Go figure, back in the day range wars were fought over water and now they don't want it.  Curious!   So he and his brother will live out their lives on the farm and had no one left in the family to leave it to.

Now when you travel through the small towns out west plan on eating at Subway.  That is the only "restaurant" in many of these small towns.  They probably won't be there on my next trip through.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Solo travel and the people you meet!

Image
Reflecting on my travels I decided that I hadn't been very good about documenting all the interesting people I have met along the way.  I have decided that I must do better, so a new blog was born.  Future posts will be more about the people along the way. Origins of this blog....Nova Scotia   While camping in Nova Scotia in 1973, a woman from a neighboring campsite brought me a half of a blueberry pie, they couldn’t eat all of it and thought I would enjoy it and I did!  A man in a pickup truck stopped at my campsite when I was getting my fly rod out and told me to get in the truck, he new all the streams in the area and fishes there every summer for a month.  We had 3 great days of fishing the Nova Scotia coast and we caught lots of trout.   So get over this fear of the unknown and go!  
Read more

May 21, 2015 - Trinidad, CO

 I had been riding the TransAmerica trail, a mostly dirt and gravel trail from NC to Oregon, when I stopped in Trinidad.  The day before I had parted ways with the group of 3 riders that I rode through OK with in heavy rainstorms.  I had planned to leave from Trinidad up into the mountains of CO and loop down through Estes Park to Denver to see my son.   Well, the bad news was it was 20 degrees up in the mountains and got 2' of snow so the trail was out and I would be riding I25 up into Denver.  I stopped at a McDonalds for breakfast and sat down to a hot cup of coffee to warm up.  Across from me was a gentleman in the corner avoiding eye contact and reading the want ads.  He was wearing fairly nice clothes and was rumpled but not really sleep on the streets dirty.  He had no food or beverage in front of him.  It was time for me to say "Mind if I join ya?"  I asked if I could buy him breakfast and he responded with "please."  I...
Read more

Why?

Well, the mind is a funny thing and over the years, while I remember the trips in general the granular information is hidden in my overloaded mental storage.  But I do remember the gist of it. Back in 2015 on a trip through Nebraska I stopped in a small town for gas and a cup of coffee.  I needed a break and had been on the road for 3 hours so it was time.  I sat down in the little dining area in the gas station and after a bit a gentleman from across the way got up and walked over to me and asked "do you mind if i join you?"  I have thought about this ever since.  I should have started gathering more information from that day forward. Another trip through Nebraska and at breakfast, in a small diner, a man in his 50's comes over to me and says "I wish I had done what you are doing, seeing the US on a motorcycle."  He sat down and waved his family over, wife and 2 children, who were none to eager to visit with a motorcycle rider,  I asked him how old he...
Read more