Round V on I-80

First thing on today’s agenda was to get another oil change for the Compass. I used to work at a car dealership all through high school so it feels like a familiar place when I find myself back in one. I have an urge to get behind the parts counter and start running an inventory and stocking parts, even though I don’t know anything about cars and what part does what or goes where. Anyways, a special thanks to the folks at Bob Mayber Jeep in North Platte for fixing me up with an oil change and a shiny spotless car. I forgot how beautiful the invasion mobile is when it’s spotless.

I almost felt just as fresh driving it, however, I noticed when I woke up in Denver on Wednesday morning that I had a pretty soar throat and was coughing. Not good. The last thing I wanted was to be driving as sick as I was feeling. But I’m a trooper and had to get where I was going, going east.

Interstate 80 in Nebraska is no new territory for me. The last four years I have found myself going from east to west and west to east through the entire state of Nebraska. This marks my 5th year in a row driving straight across Nebraska. For most people, I-80 is all they see in Nebraska, they see it as a state they have to go through to get to where they’re going.

I’m happy to say that I can now experience a little more of Nebraska, a town on each end of the state and now right here in the middle in Loup City. A couple months before I left on this trip, which seems to be an eternity ago already, I e-mailed the tourism offices of all 50 states seeing if I could find some hosts and different towns to stay in. Sadly, most states blew it off, they offered me a free map and tourist guide and that was it. However, Nebraska was a different story. Nebraska embraced my trip from the beginning and forwarded my e-mail to every county in the state. In only a few days I had about a dozen places to stay; at that point I knew Nebraska would be more than welcoming.