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.
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