Terri and Peter's RV Adventures

Early morning on the Milk House @Smiling Ranch where it doesn’t matter if it’s Sunday or Monday: Young Gus, age 14, wielding a pitch fork, expertly and in a manner showing how routine this is, ripping apart massive, round hay bales to feed the horses, mule, and steers; Bob-the-Corgie (who slept under our trailer and was there to greet us when we opened our door), stealing an egg from the chickens and playing keep away from Lily who zooms circles around him while he eats it, leaving her the shells; pigs not in blankets, curious about this black lab rushing to greet them through the cyclone fence; ranchers saddling horses, and hauling a huge trailer off to brand the calves. It’s not even 8:30 am.

Reluctantly, we packed up from this bucolic place where we’d hoped to stay two nights, missing the kid-lassoing calves for branding event and began our drive across the rest of Nebraska to Council Bluffs, Iowa. The steering-optional driving on I80 East continued as the scenery gradually morphed from a western-style rocky grey stone pallet to the more midwestern familiar greenery of newborn bright green leaves starkly contrasting the sturdy brown barked oaks, trunks supporting branches and leaves seemingly impervious to wind, snow, rain. Their twisted textures reminded me of the talking apple trees in the Wizard of Oz.

Thick green grasses dotted with yellow dandelions and tiny white flowers evoke the murmurs of a midwestern summer. The towns and cities of Nebraska are familiar and strung like beads on the long, straight thread of I80: Kearney, Grand Island, Lincoln, Omaha. All of them seem hardly more than suburbs except for Omaha which has more freeway lanes and even a building taller than one story.

Stops for gas and a rest area for lunch extended our four hour drive to six but we were grateful to do this drive today rather than early tomorrow morning as it has brought us 15 minutes from our RV repair appointment tomorrow morning.

Probably the highlight of the drive was a billboard outside of Omaha advertising the 32nd annual Testicle Festival over Father’s Day weekend. Yes, you read right. Of course it’s being held at a steakhouse in a ballroom. The website boasts that the founders committed to running this event are devout Christians. Plan today! https://www.roundthebendsteakhouse.com/festival I’m sure everyone will have a ball. They may even drink high balls. Ok. I’m done.

We arrived at our second Harvest Host, The Long Walk Farm, an organic produce farm run by Tiff and Matthew. (The farm got its name from Matthew’s proposal when he asked Tiff if she’d take a long walk with him…they’re still walking 20 years later.) They are very gracious and welcoming as is his sister and nephew and of course, Milo, the farm shitzu! Milo and Lily formed an instant bond as she did with the little boy who threw her balls nonstop.

We bought some just-harvested spinach, bok choy and carrots as well as some home made jams. It’s a lovely little place run by this couple committed to educating people about the importance of growing and eating organic produce. They each have day jobs but this farm takes up a huge amount of their life when not working.

Meeting locals, talking to them about this life they’ve created is inspiring and interesting. I’m so glad we’ve chosen to go to Harvest Host locations even when they don’t offer the same amenities as regular campgrounds.

Once again, we’re very grateful. We can’t believe that tomorrow will mark one week since we left home. It seems like a month as our experiences have been so varied and our days densely packed. We really hope that our grey and black tank situation is finally fixed so we can get on with the trip without porta potties and preoccupation with tank levels and restrictions on water usage. Cross fingers we can move to our next planned site which is seven miles away from the RV repair place, Manaway Lake Park. Thanks for following. See you at the Testicle Festival.