A Little Roundabout Trip To Nebraska, Day 5, Rugby

The next day was spent in the Rugby area where we accomplished the reason for coming here, which was to see our little 68 acre piece of land that we bought several years ago (it's a long story) but have never seen.  It turned out to be about 45 miles south of town and in the middle of nowhere.  We had pretty good directions but still got lost and happened to stop at a home to ask for directions and it turned out this guy had sold the land to the person we bought it from (what are the chances) so he knew exactly how to get there.  Here are pics of the land and the road it’s on starting from the top of the road and shooting east.  In the distance you can see the pond (called sloughs here) and they are everywhere and at some point they are big enough to be called a lake and they are often dry.

A Little Roundabout Trip To Nebraska, Day 4, Rugby

On day four we drove from St. Cloud, MN to Rugby, ND to kill one of the birds with that one stone.  I won’t go into the details but many years ago we ended up with a small piece of land near Rugby that we had never seen so since we were going all the way to Nebraska, we decided to go a little farther and see our little 68 acres - they farm by the square mile out in these parts.

Rugby’s claim to fame is that the geographical center of North America (Mexico, USA, and Canada) is located there.  It was too cold and windy for us to pose with the marker.

A Little Roundabout Trip To Nebraska, Day 3, St. Cloud

The third day we drove from Madison, WI to St Cloud, MN via I-90 & I-94 and, just as the previous day, we saw fields and fields of corn and soybeans to the horizon ready to be harvested.  

A Little Roundabout Trip To Nebraska, Day 2, Madison

On day 2, we drove from Murphysboro, Il to Madison WI via US-51, I-74, I-39, and I-90 where I planned a stop in downtown Decatur, IL for lunch.  Since we got an early start that morning, it was too early for lunch when we got to Decatur, so we went on up to Bloomington, IL and ate at Cracker Barrel – haven’t eaten at one in several years. 

Our next leg took us to Madison WI for a stay at the Holiday Inn Express and supper but after discovering my restaurant of choice was closed, we opted to eat at the Northern Taphouse.

A Little Roundabout Trip To Nebraska, Day 1 Continued, 1t Street BBQ

For supper on Day 1, we swung a little off the interstate path and went to Murphysboro, IL so we could have supper at 17^th Street BBQ home of “The Legend.”  Back in the days of my hobby BBQ business, I followed the world of competition BBQ pretty closely so I was very aware of Mike Mills.  In the world of barbecue, champion pitmaster Mike Mills is affectionately known as “The Legend” and his specialty was pork ribs.

A Little Roundabout Trip To Nebraska, Day 1, Home to Murphysboro

We’ve been trying to visit our daughter, Kathy, in Nebraska for a few years but with RV and other issues we have yet to make it, so this year we decided to go if at all possible.  We tried to accomplish killing several birds with one stone (explained as we go) so we took a pretty convoluted way of getting from our place to Hartington, NE.  I’ve always been a get from point A to point B traveler but for this trip, and taking a clue from friends Laurie and Dave (Big Daddy Dave we took a more leisurely pace (except coming home) and stopped for lunch vs. our usual of one stop for gas, fast-food, and bathroom.  While Dave and Laurie generally take the back roads, I did mostly interstate as we had a bit of a time schedule to meet.

Our First Pho Try And Women’s Hair Revisited

I’ve never eaten Vietnamese Pho or any other Oriental noodle bowl that I can remember but I was inspired to try it by watching TV.  After seeing it made on several Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives shows, I realize the key ingredient in Oriental noodle bowls is the broth but I didn’t want to put in the effort for a first try as my main goal was to use up the case of ramen noodles that Bev bought.  As Blondie might say to Dagwood – “I know we never eat Ramen but I saved a lot of money by buying a case of it.”  I looked at several recipes online then made up the one below.  Since Madison was here with her no-gluten boyfriend, I cooked some rice noodles as well.