Nebraska - Days 2 - 7 - in the Omaha area

Gretna/West Omaha KOA, Gretna

Sunday, 2 through Friday, 7 October 2022

I'd only made a reservation here for 3 nights but ended up staying a full week.  That's partly because I wanted to see my cousin (more below) and see something of Omaha (ditto), and partly because I had a lot of unfinished business that all that running around toward the end of my MN month kept me from, and this was a comfortable campground to do all that in.

In the campground

Daytime temps were warm enough that we had to use the AC in the late afternoon several days.  But despite forecasts only in the low 50s for overnight temps, it still felt really chilly in the mornings and we had to use the heater.  And then the last couple of days a cold front came through and dropped the temps by 20° or more.

During the 4 full days I spent actually in the campground, I made a heroic effort and managed to write a couple of weeks' worth of posts for my time in Minnesota.  I needed just another day or so to finish writing the month there, but I figured a full week in this one small spot of this big state was plenty and I'd deal with the remaining 4 posts the next time I had an internet signal.

I also tried to make reservations for much of the rest of my month in Nebraska, which turned out to be harder than I'd expected.  Many of the state parks weren't taking reservations for campsites, because this is apparently no longer tourist season.  If their campgrounds were even open (not all were) then campsites were first-come-first-served, which always makes me nervous (where do I go if they're full?).

I knew I'd be going to Grand Island, so I called ahead and managed to find a medical clinic that would accept me (I needed to get a blood test to show my potassium level will allow me to continue with my blood pressure meds), and I found a vet clinic to trim Lily's nails and look at a sore place on Dexter's back that's been worrying me.  Once I'd made those appointments, I made my reservation at the Grand Island KOA long enough to include them.

After that I ran into the walk-in-only problem at subsequent state parks and settled for just knowing a general route I'd be taking.

I did have an odd experience with the KOA at Ogalalla in western Nebraska.  There are actually 2 KOAs there, both owned by the same family, and both were supposed to be open all year.  But when I checked online, I learned one of them was already closed for the season, so I called the other to make a reservation.  The photos on their website showed the only sites they had that were water/electric (cheaper) were on a slope, which would be seriously uncomfortable for us.  So I asked for one of their full-hookup sites.  The woman said those sites weren't for RVs my size, and that I either needed to go in one of the sloped ones or pay nearly double for a patio site.  I could see on their website they had plenty of full-hookup sites available with photos showing big rigs in them, but she insisted they weren't for RVs my size.  I asked why they wouldn't let me have one of those spaces if I were willing to pay for it, just because I have one of the shorter RVs, and she insisted it didn't have anything to do with having a shorter RV, it was just that my RV didn't fit that sort of space.  It was a bizarre conversation, with me pointing out reality and she gaslighting me.  My guess is that their other KOA that's closed for the winter is where they usually send the smaller RVs and they've been reserving the sites here for the bigger rigs - and this woman just hasn't yet adjusted to the fact that with the other site closed, they might want to reconsider that policy.  After that, I stopped trying to find reservations anywhere for the time being.

One night I watched Working Girl and noticed in the long shot of Manhattan at the end that the Twin Towers were there.  It still seems impossible that they aren't there any more and even more impossible how they were destroyed.  And why.  But I also find it impossible to understand why Muslim mosques and Jewish temples are being destroyed in this country.  Hate seems to know no boundaries.

My water pump started making a lot of noise again, and eventually I realized it was the same noise it used to make before the repair guy in Reno installed noise-deadening equipment.  It occurred to me both that I'd gotten spoiled for having a quiet water pump, and that maybe all the bouncy roads I've been driving on recently had loosened the pump from its moorings.  So I opened up the under-seat compartment and, sure enough, I was able to tighten the screws holding the pump down.  I figure if even I, with little upper body strength, can tighten the screws, the pump must have come loose.  And in fact, when I put everything back together the pump operated almost as quietly as usual.  I felt pretty proud of myself for diagnosing and solving the problem on my own.

Dexter

One day when Dext and I were walking around the campground, we heard a really loud bang that was quite startling to both of us, until I realized it was probably from the interstate not far away and a semi likely blew out a tire.  I explained it to Dext, but he didn't seem to be as reassured as I was.

I made a very foolish mistake that I won't make again: I gave Dext the t-bone bone left over from when I had a steak.  I remembered he'd had a bad reaction to a bone I gave him last month, but I thought it was just because it was a commercial product, and that it'd be different for him with a regular bone that I knew where it came from.  I was wrong.

He ate the entire bone in about an hour, and both of us paid the price.  I woke up just after midnight to a bad smell and found that Dext had lost it from both ends.  Thoroughly.  I cleaned it all up, took out the trash, took the dog bed he'd messed up out to air on the picnic table, took Dext out for a walk where he pooped again, and then got back into bed about 1:00.

After all that, I slept late, woke up about 4:30 and found more mess from both ends.  Repeated all the procedure, took Dext out again, and this time found a little blood in his semi-solid stool.  Clearly bones are not a good influence on his body and I just hate to think of what his insides are going through to produce the blood.  Sure makes me a bad mother.  A shame, too, because he's got the teeth and jaws that are built to crunch bones.  But we won't be doing that again.

They have a nice dog park at this campground, and Dext met several new dogs.  As usual, though, he displayed real interest and even played a few minutes, and then that was it.  No matter what overtures the other dogs made.

Visit with my cousin

I left the campground on 2 different days for 2 entirely different reasons.  One day I drove over to Bellevue, a suburb of Omaha that sits almost on the Iowa border, not far from the Missouri River.  A sign proclaims them to be "Nebraska's First City," so I looked it up.  It's also called the "Birthplace of Nebraska" because it was the first town established in Nebraska - in 1822.

today's route

Bellevue is where my cousin Michelle lives.  She's my first cousin, daughter of my mother's sister, and we've never met.  I'm still not sure why, though I suspect it's because of a substantial age difference between the sisters that meant Michelle's mother grew up almost as an only child.  And when they grew up and settled in states that were fairly far apart (for travel styles 70 or so years ago) - well, I never met my aunt except when I was very young, so of course I never met her kids.

But we have now and it was great.  It didn't take long for us to be able to talk comfortably together, and our visit lasted a good part of the day.  And we both knew different pieces of our family's history and could fill in some blanks for each other, which was really nice.

And for a while, her brother Mike was also there, and we could get to know each other.  So on this trip, I've been lucky enough to have visited cousins coast-to-coast and in between.  And these are all cousins from my mother's small family.  Not sure how we all got so flung out across the country.  Unlike my father's very large family who almost all settled in Texas, except my cousin Karen who lives in Florida, who I visited at the very early stages of this trip and who I'll get to see at Christmas when I do my month in Florida.  Families are odd; they're like the marriages that created them, I guess - all unique and yet all with things in common.

Michelle and I walked Dext around the neighborhood a couple of times, and when I was on the way back to the campground I stopped at Everett Park in Bellevue to give him one more chance to relieve himself before we tackled going-home traffic.

At this park I saw rose gardens that were very specifically planted to demonstrate how to raise roses without fuss (my translation).  A sign said one garden had been planted in 2009 and the other in 2010.  Both were grown without pesticides, without fertilizers, without any winter protection (and remember, this is Nebraska), and without any water (besides what nature provided) once the plants were established.  And even in early October there were some beautiful blooms and very healthy plants in those gardens.

Sightseeing in Omaha

today's route

I had a lot to get done today, though I didn't leave the campground until quarter to 10:00.  I stopped first at a grocery store, locally owned, for groceries; then at a Dillard's, not locally owned, for stuff to clean my skin (traveling is hard on every part of me, including my skin); and then we went to a dog park I'd found online.

Today was cloudy, very windy and cold so our time in the very large dog park wasn't as happy as I'd hoped.  Dext met some other dogs and did his currently usual routine of showing great interest in the other dogs for about 3 minutes and then going off to sniff around the park for signs of dogs who once were there.  So unlike the way he used to want to play with everybody whether they wanted to or not.  But it's only been 4 months since Gracie died and he may still be trying to find his feet in this changed world of his.

I passed some interesting buildings but couldn't stop to take my own photos and couldn't find any usable photos of them online.  For instance, there was the building labeled CHI Health Center which was clearly a convention center/arena sort of building - but that name.  I had to hunt for the info online but found that the name came as one of those naming rights things - like baseball stadiums named for banks.  CHI Health says it's a nonprofit health system, and they think athletics are a good way to reduce the incidence of obesity. 

I saw lots of public art around town.  I passed the Home of Hiland Milk, the factory for a brand of milk I've been buying in the last few states.  Creighton University is in Omaha, though the part I saw was mostly under construction.  And I passed the Omaha campus for the University of Nebraska.  The university says it's one school with 4 branches: one here is focused on medicine; a second one here aims to provide education for urban residents; the one in Lincoln is the main campus, a land-grant college that's one of the Big Ten schools; the one in Kearney focuses on undergraduate education.

I saw some attractive buildings on the campus here that I think must be for urbanites (rather than medical personnel), and none of those buildings had a decent photo online that wasn't under copyright.  One of the most prominent was a campanile, built in 1989 with 47 bronze bells.  At 168' tall, it can be seen for quite a distance.

And then I stopped at the Great Plains Black History Museum.  I thought maybe they'd be able to tell me how and why Black folks ended up in the Plains states in general and in Nebraska in particular, since the usual history books just talk about European settlers.  But the museum turned out to have a different focus, though I was still able to get the answers, at least in part.

I should say at the outset that the lighting in the room sometimes cast a glare on the glass protecting the displays, and I had a hard time getting clear shots.

I was met at the entrance by a man who guided me through their exhibits, explaining what they had and why they chose these things to display.  He was also very well informed about Black history and told me later that he was a history professor at a local college (I've forgotten which one).

In the entrance room, they had a revolving exhibit about Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

the location of all the HBCUs in the country

Then, in the exhibition hall (which was actually a room, not a hall, though they did the best they could with their limited space), their first group of exhibits moved from "Hate" to "Hope."

I couldn't stomach most of what was in the "Hate" group, and here's the only display I could stand to take a photo of.  These photos show a small quilt devoted to women who were lynched, followed by the quilt's caption enlarged, and then an explanation for how and why the quilt came to be made.

the quilt

the caption, shown in the quilt photo

And that's followed by a map outlining the Great Plains area with a pin marking where each known lynching occurred in that area.

Notice how far north those lynchings go - even up to North Dakota; people who believe prejudice is pretty much restricted to the South are kidding themselves.

The "Hope" section was certainly easier to take, and they thoughtfully emphasized only the hopeful aspects and not the hateful ones (such as the assassination of Dr. King).  Of course they had the presidency of Barack Obama represented.  But the largest section was an exhibition called "The March on Washington For Jobs and Freedom: A Half Century Remembrance of the Dream."  And I noticed that in August of next year it'll be the 60th anniversary of this march, and I can't help but wonder just how much things have changed, or if they have.

With about 250,000 in attendance, this was
"the largest demonstration ever seen in the nation's capital."

While I was talking to the guide about this march, it occurred to me to wonder why it was such a peaceful event.  How could all the hate groups (increasing civil rights gains reactivated the Klan in the 1960s) have managed to avoid such a gathering of Black people without at least jeering or trying to start fights or anything at all?  Was it the sheer number of people who attended that scared them silent?  A quarter million people would have dwarfed even a gathering of every Klan member in the country.  There's strength in numbers, as the saying goes.

The museum was also proud to display a traveling exhibition from the Smithsonian National Museum of African-American History and Culture, which distilled information about the Jim Crow era into a few clear displays.

There was also a section that highlighted sports figures that came from Nebraska, including the great football player Gale Sayers, so famous that even I've heard of him.  Other local figures I didn't know, though I'm sure sports enthusiasts do.

And finally there was a small exhibit about news photographer Rudy Smith.  I don't remember that I've heard his name but I know I've seen his photos.  Here's what the museum showed.

explains the RFK photo above

describes the situation behind the photo above

After leaving the museum, I noticed a historic marker on the wall outside.  The museum is one of several establishments currently housed in this historic building.

While I was in the Omaha area, I'd wanted to visit the Strategic Air Command Museum here, but I learned online that they charge $12 + tax for seniors, and that was too high a price for my interest level.

I thought Omaha was a very attractive city.  For some reason I hadn't expected it, so it was a pleasant surprise.  Lots of trees and parks.