Trip 5: Day 32 (Omaha & Lincoln)

I think my life is a series of searches for wifi hotspots and in-network ATM machines, and very little else. For whatever reason, I get awful cell phone reception in Lincoln. Everywhere I've gone, I've had either 1-2 bars of 2G, or no service at all. I was able to get wifi at a Vietnamese sandwich shop, but they had quite a lunch rush and not much for space, so I didn't stay long. Meanwhile, I had $2 on me and needed to find an ATM. I had left a map of in-network ATMs up and went for one near where I was, waiting for a brewery to open at 4pm. The street where the ATM was supposed to be did not go through, because it dead-ended at Bryan Memorial Hospital.
The Co-Op ATM locator app just loves to put me in hospitals. This was the fourth random hospital I'd been to on account of this app. A lot of people dislike hospitals because they remind them of death. I don't necessarily have that association. If anything, hospitals make me think of pain, but also of relaxation. I've been in hospitals four times, that I can recall: at age 9 in Tennessee when I had my appendix out, at age 16 in Shanghai when I broke my leg; at age 16 (a few months later) getting surgery on my broken leg; and at age 19 in Houston when I volunteered for a guinea pig study as a favor for a girl. I find that being a patient in a hospital typically means being catered to, and being able to watch a lot of really terrible television. But they all have a smell. The last time I was in a hospital, it was actually a hospice outside New Orleans, and I was visiting my now-deceased uncle just after he had been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. That hospice had a smell.
And the hospital here in Lincoln definitely had that same smell. I walked through most of that hospital, looking for that ATM. I could see the address I was seeking on a doorway that was under construction, so I tried to go into the next doorway, which happened to be the mental health inpatient area. I tried to look as sane as I could while walking up to it. I was told that there was an ATM, but I had to go around since the other entrance was closed. Going around, I found an information booth staffed by an older gentleman, and asked where the ATM was. He stood up, pointed down the hall, and told me to ask the person at the next counter. The other woman was "filling in," and gave me a vague description, which turned out to be right. But it was the wrong ATM. I was also on the wrong side of the building though, so I thought there was hope that there was another ATM there.
I wound up at the radiology intake desk, and a woman who claimed she was happy to have an excuse to leave her desk, took me to the basement, where the cafeteria was. Another woman cleaning the cafeteria, whose daughter sat nearby reading a book on a pile of chairs, pointed out the ATM, which was at the end of a group of vending machines. Success! I got my fee-free currency and bought my burrito down the street, before going to the brewery.

The brewery was a bust. Seriously, it was bad. They had been open since late 2011 and are canning, and that's all surprising considering how bad the beer is. I mean, I'm pretty sure one of them was just outright tainted. There was both an ESB and a wine barrel-aged ESB. When I picked up the first, I thought it was the barrel-aged one because it was a bit funky. The next one though had intense notes of super sweet wine, so that was definitely it, and the other one was just straight out funky. In over 350 breweries and brewpubs visited, I've had beer worse than this many times, but I can't recall many breweries with beer this bad; just brewpubs. Brewpubs are often geared toward the restaurant side, and the house beer is just a novelty. But they don't serve food at this brewery, and the atmosphere kinda sucked, so this was a loss on all fronts. A company had decided to knock off early and all come here. And they got drunk quickly. One guy stumbled out to his truck, with me afraid he was going to try and drive, but he just threw his tool belt in and continued drinking. Meanwhile, the guys inside were joking about his alcoholism.
I also tried to go to another brewery last night, Zipline, but the place was so packed that I just turned around and came back to my motel, which was less than a mile away. I decided then to try for another brewpub in Downtown Lincoln, Empyrean.

Empyrean, to my knowledge, does not have a facility open to the public. Instead, they partner or run Lazlo's, a restaurant in the Haymarket District of Lincoln. The Haymarket is a former warehouse and industrial space northwest of Downtown Lincoln. It's been redeveloped as a restaurant and bar area, and is quite popular. On my first trip to Lincoln, I came here at night, then back again in the morning for my first Midwest farmers market (I was impressed).
Last night though was the last day of the semester for the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. I expected crowds, and that's what I got. I circled a few times, but could not find parking within four blocks. Even the garages were full. After a few minutes, I gave up, and chose to try and get to another brewpub inside of a restaurant.

Misty's is a long-standing Lincoln steakhouse in its northern Havelock neighborhood, but was purchased by two investors in 2001, who then opened two other locations. As far as I could tell, they did not brew here, though this location is called "Restaurant & Brewpub" on Google. They brew beer under the Modern Monks label, which is canned and available locally. I had a Belgian IPA. It wasn't bad. Certainly better than the other place. They had six or seven taps, all of them under 6%, which is not necessarily a bad thing. I had thought about trying another beer, but the bartender was also covering tables it seemed, and I gave up after a few minutes, coming close to my free hour at the parking garage next door.

I started out the day in Council Bluffs, carefully watching the traffic reports on TV so I wouldn't have to wait until after rush hour to leave. Typically, in large cities with traffic problems, I'll just do things at the hotel in the morning until about 9 or 9:30 before leaving. But I felt comfortable in Omaha; the traffic just isn't that bad. And it wasn't.

West Dodge "express lanes"

"So Omaha"

US 6 leaves Omaha as the West Dodge Expressway, initially signed as "Express Lanes" as you exit from I-680, where it forms an elevated portion over several intersections and a ground-level local deck. The two sections merge together just after 120th Street and continue west, with US 6 eventually exiting and turning south, toward Gretna.

Gretna is an Omaha exurb. I've met people living in Gretna before, and they're happy to talk about it and its small town atmosphere, though they're the ones slowly ruining it with tract housing developments and chain restaurants. There are a number of these formerly small towns outside Omaha that now serve as bedroom communities. On the turn-off for Gretna's business district, there was a single brown "Historic US 6" route sign. However, at the two-way stop in the middle of Gretna, there were no other indications of this former route. It was disappointing because, from maps, it's very difficult to determine where US 6 went in this area. It's possible that, in Gretna, it turns south to merge back with its current routing, following the railroad southwest to Lincoln.

Ashland is the same way. Though there are no signs, the town is over a half mile away from US 6, on the other side of the railroad tracks. In 1947, the route still apparently avoided the town completely. Ashland sits on the Oregon Trail, at a point where the normally muddy Salt Creek has a limestone bottom, making it a point where it's easy to ford. It's also only about two miles from the Platte River, which can range from broad and swift to narrow and slow. In early May, it was broad and swift, heavy with snowmelt and all of the recent rain. Crossing the Platte River on US 6, you encounter the Linoma Beach Lighthouse.
A group of local residents bought the lighthouse, and the adjacent Linoma Beach RV resort in September 2013, with the objective of preserving the decaying structure. From my last visit in 2010, they've done a really job of it, though the structure is not open and the actual beach, as I understand it, is still closed.

Ashland is small town America at its core. This was my third trip to the town, and I've always been impressed with how iconic it can be. This time, there was a new building under construction on the brick-lined main street. Older women strolled out of the cafe after a late breakfast, people went in and out of the local bank.

After a brief stop in Waverly to use the wifi at a McDonald's to get my maps back up, I found the park where I planned to start my Lincoln bike ride. As the weather had finally warmed up, this was exciting to actually get out and bike. The Dietrich Trail started as mostly gravel, at one point loose, but turned quickly to concrete. However, it was mostly just large sidewalks, so none of it was a particularly pleasant ride. Lincoln is also actually quite industrial, and you get to see a lot of that on that trail.
I got to the "Quilt House" and decided to turn around, but not before stopping in to find out exactly what the hell a quilt house is.

Entering Lincoln on US 6.
Here, it once (1940's on) split into
"City US 6" and US 6, with the latter
following the Cornhusker Highway
that it still follows today.

It's actually a quilt museum ("international" quilt museum). I was told that the founder was a New Yorker who had some sort of connection with the university's textile department, and donated his collection to it. Eventually, it became this quilt house. Honestly, I have no interest in quilting, so I didn't pay the admission. I really just wanted to use their bathroom, and feigned interest for a bit.

It turns out that Lincoln has a Vietnamese part of town, along 27th Street near Y Street. There are a few markets and a few restaurants, one of which is Banhwich, a Vietnamese sandwich place. It was actually quite good. They either bake the bread there or get it from somewhere locally, because it was better than other smaller city banh mis I've had in the past. And it's pretty popular. There was a line out the door by the time I left, at just a bit after noon.

Entering Lincoln, I followed the former "City US 6," which existed until 1983, according to an uncited Wikipedia article. This US 6 route splits from the current version at 70th Street on Cottner Boulevard, which is what the route was called in its entirety to O Street at that time, though most of the streets have maintained their more logical numbered names now, likely to avoid confusion.
Eventually, Cottner Boulevard (and the former US 6) splits off and heads in a south-southwest direction. It's a nice residential area here, with tree-lined streets. At Holdrege Street, there's a little shopping district with a used record store and other shops. Cottner forms a sort of square when it intersects O Street, centered around what is now a bank building. I'll have to research this section because it seems like it has some history. But this is where the former US 6 turned onto O Street, joining US 34 and following it into Downtown Lincoln.

Two Casey's, across the street from
one another.

Shopping area on Cottner at Holdrege

Cottner Boulevard

The state capitol offers tours on the hour except for at noon. When I got there, it was about 12:40, so I walked around a bit. When I got back to where the tours met, a group of about 40 schoolkids had found their way in there, and were sitting in a circle while a man talked about life as a pioneer. When they got up and followed him down the hall, I snuck by to lean against a wall, hoping that they were starting a tour for everyone else at 1, as it was a bit before. It didn't happen. That was the tour, and that was disappointing. While I waited, another group of about 10 kids showed up. One of the moms was told by the staff to be quiet after a bit, as they just stood there in the lobby, so they went up to the observation deck, where I found them running wild. I took a few pictures and left fairly quickly.

Eventually, after stopping randomly at the "Children's Zoo" (I didn't realize what it was until I walked over closer to it), I wound up in Pioneers Park, southwest of the city. Though the park includes a lake, trails, picnic tables and a golf course, the centerpiece is the nature center, at the park's western end. Here, the city (who operates the park) engages the community in environmental education, with both prairie restoration on the flora side, and a number of contained animals on the fauna side. Birds, snakes, a pair of elk, geese, a beehive and a herd of bison. The snakes and the screech owls are stored in a building to the south of the road, where the man who appeared to be running the place ignored my entrance and continued talking about the facilities to another person. The two rat snakes were active, possibly because it was close to their feeding time. There were two screech owls in a cage. They both watched me approach, one standing at a perch above the other, and the other made a slight noise. They watched me until I finally went away.

Pictures. I'm going to have to go back and redo these. I'm sitting at a table in a truck stop, and the staff are getting impatient. The wifi at my motel last night was worse than shit, so I had to wait and upload everything.

UPRR crew working near Ashland