Tuesday, July 5, 2022- Omaha, Nebraska

     The heat had zapped us all so much yesterday that we needed some of this morning to recover.  Abby and her mom slept until almost 9:00.  We missed the hotel breakfast, but Scott saw it as an opportunity to finally try the breakfast pizza from Casey’s that we had heard about on YouTube. 

     We had plans to be in Kearney, Nebraska, by tonight, but we decided to spend the better part of the day in Omaha.  There were a number of thngs that we still wanted to see here, and we could save the hottest part of the day for driving.

     Our first stop was to go to downtown Omaha to see Omar the Troll.  He is a blue troll statue that sits on top of his house under the Bob Kerry Pedestrian Bridge.  “Many miles I’ve roamed to find this place I call home,” he wrote on the large rock next to here he left his walking stick.   He apparently has a book written about his story.  Abby tickled his toes.  

     Next to the bridge was a fountain/splash pad that Abby wanted to play in.  At first there was just only tiny fountain squirting slowly upward, and Abby was content with that.  But when some other kids came, they found a button to push what started up a dozen or so more.  While Abby and the girls were at the fountain, Scott walked the length of the Bob Kerry bridge and back again.  It is .9 K, one-way, and spans the Missouri River to Iowa.   The state line is marked on the bridge so you can see when you cross from one to the other.  It was warm already, since it was after 10:00, but Scott enjoyed the walk.

     When Scott returned, we went next door to the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail Headquarters Visitor Center.  We’ve seen a number of sites associated with them and their epic journey, from Fort Mandan  in North Dakota, to Fort Clatsop in Oregon, and the point of their return in St. Louis.  It seemed like we should stop here.  The park outside of the building has wild flowers and other plants growing tall there to represent what the region had when the Corps of Discovery arrived there.  There was a 25 minute video to watch that was made and narrated by Ken Burns and many actors that he often uses like Matthew Broderick and Sam Waterson.   We were the only ones there for it and we had to request that the ranger start it up.  Since we were alone, we thought Abby might be ok in the theater, but when she started getting restless, Julie took her out to the lobby to color.  Besides the movie and the gift shop, there was not a whole lot else there,  It was a big building and must be used for office space for the park administration.  Scott bought a set of the four nickels that had Lewis and Clark themed designs on them from 2003 and 2004.  Emma thought he was crazy for spending $6 to get twenty cents.  We also got Abby a tube of animals.  She started out this trip with four llamas that came with a book, but we’re somehow down to just one.  This set of American wild animals can give her some more friends to play with as we continue west, and maybe we will see some of the real ones as we come to the mountains.   There were only a few hands on exhibits in the lobby area, but one of them had some hats and uniforms to try on.  Abby grabbed a bicorn hat and said she looked like a pirate and got us all laughing.

     We moved the car a few blocks and went to a part of the city that Julie and Emma wanted to visit.  It is called the Old Market.  It is a part of the downtown that has been turned from warehouses to upscale shops and restaurants.  The area is several city blocks long and wide, and the whole area is marked by streets that are paved with red brick.  We ate at the first one we came to.  It was called the Twisted Fork and it was decorated with a  Western/ cowboy theme.  The food cost a little more but was better than just fast food.  From there, we started to explore.  One gallery area was called the Old Market Passageway that was apparently the alleyway between two industrial buildings but is now covered with potted plants and greenery.  It’s so pretty there that they have lots of warnings against using anything other than cellphones to take pictures with.  We looked through a few of the shops in the Old Market area.  One bookstore had a sign enticing people in with two arrows- one pointed to the air conditioning inside and the other pointed to the humid hellscape outside.  The heat was making it a little hard to enjoy the shops, but they were also hard to negotiate with a stroller.  They were often small spaces but the entryways usually had several steps up and the area certainly didn’t seem to be ADA friendly.  The girls decided that they had seen enough, and Abby was getting hot and restless.  We left after only exploring a few blocks.   They never did find the bakery with cupcakes and sweet treats that they were hoping to find, but we did visit a Christmas store and the Old Market Candy Company before we left.  The time on our parking meter was set to expire at 2:00 anyway, so we packed up and left, heading west on Route 80 towards Kearney.

     Abby had time to nap for most of the way, and Emma slept for part of it too.  Scott blogged in the back while Julie drove.  Julie noticed that the land had gotten much flatter than Iowa's, and she thought that Iowa was definitely prettier.   She says that there are also a lot of big bugs.  "It's like driving through a snowstorm of bugs!" she said as they were splatting against the windshield.

     We got to Kearney at about 5:00 and checked in to the hotel easily.  After unpacking the car and cooling off, Scott and Julie went out to rustle up some grub. Yesterday, we asked the tram driver at the zoo for a recommendation for a Nebraska restaurant.  He suggested Runza which had its own signature kind of sandwhich.  There was one near our hotel tonight, so we went there.  The sandwich is similar to the Maid-Rite that Scott tried yesterday, but it was smaller, had a different kind of roll that it was stuffed into, and was said to contain cabbage, onions, and a secret combination of spices.  We both enjoyed it.  We picked up some Japanese food for Emma and got some gas station pizza slices ("Godfather's Pizza") to see if Abby would eat those.   She can be picky, but lately she has been excited about pizza.  

     We made sure that there was a pool at this hotel when we made the reservations, and we're going to make use of it after dinner.  Scott is posting this blog and not expecting to have to add anything else tonight, but he will come back and edit it if we do anything else worth noting.