This morning we made our first trip through the Sand Hills of Nebraska, which is a very interesting place. I would love to return when the Sandhill Cranes are there. Tonight we are in Hays, Kansas, where it was 103 degrees when we got out of the car at 7 p.m. (Toto, we are not in Montana anymore!) However, the feature of the day was a stop at the Golden Spike Tower, the official visitor center for Union Pacific's Bailey Yard, in North Platte, Nebraska. The Frog, who has loved trains forever, really enjoyed many of the train activities we have seen while on this trip, especially some of the coal facilities and coal trains we happened to see along the road. There are huge coal trains originating from the Gillette, Wyoming area ( >150 trains daily), which provides a large portion of the coal used for electrical generation in the US. All of that was interesting, but this was special. Bailey Yard is the world's largest train yard. The Golden Spike Tower has several displays and provides a bird's eye view of this mammoth operation. Bailey Yard is 8 miles long and 2 miles wide, handles more than 15,000 cars per day, and has a locomotive service area that employs 750 people and services 350 locomotives a day. Pictures to be added when we get home.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Lots of Rocks...
...or at least two particular large rocks. We started the day at Devils Tower National Monument, which is a mountain of solidified lava that cooled into vertical columns with primarily hexagonal cross sections. We first encountered this type of thing at Devils Postpile National Monument last summer on the east side of the Sierra Mountains. It also appears to be the same thing at Sheepeaters Cliffs in Yellowstone that we saw last week. However, the cross section of the structures is MUCH larger at Devils Tower. In the other two cases they were only a few feet across. At Devils Tower, they looked to be 6-10 feet across.
We again thought of Gwen when we saw climbers make their way up the 1200 foot sheer face. We only hope if she decides to attempt such a climb she will have the good sense not to tell us ahead of time!
We then went to Mount Rushmore, another very big rock, but interesting nonetheless. Almost as interesting was following Iron Mountain Road through the Black Hills to get there...great scenery, tunnels through the mountain, and the pigtail bridges.
I will add pictures of the above when I get a chance. We are currently in Chadron, Nebraska, center of the Pine Ridge region of Nebraksa. I didn't even know there was a Pine Ridge region...still looks mostly like prairie to me. We should go through the Sand Hills this morning as we head south.
We again thought of Gwen when we saw climbers make their way up the 1200 foot sheer face. We only hope if she decides to attempt such a climb she will have the good sense not to tell us ahead of time!
We then went to Mount Rushmore, another very big rock, but interesting nonetheless. Almost as interesting was following Iron Mountain Road through the Black Hills to get there...great scenery, tunnels through the mountain, and the pigtail bridges.
I will add pictures of the above when I get a chance. We are currently in Chadron, Nebraska, center of the Pine Ridge region of Nebraksa. I didn't even know there was a Pine Ridge region...still looks mostly like prairie to me. We should go through the Sand Hills this morning as we head south.
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