25 June - Day 27: Stirling CO to Ogallala NE - 154.1 km @ 17.9 km/h

I was up early and had pancakes at the restaurant and read the paper. There was a great cartoon which had the famous line ‘Jack and Jill went up the hill to collect a pail of water’. This was followed by a picture of two fat kids and the line ‘Except they are too obese to make it up the hill’. Ouch.

My goal was to be on the road as early as possible and I was out the door before 8 a.m. I had hoped that the day would be like yesterday, hot but with no wind, but I was definitely out of luck. There was an overcast sky which suggested rain and a wind. Not only a wind, but a strong headwind.

I cycled into Sterling and as it was Sunday morning there was not much traffic so it was fine cycling through town. Soon I was out into the countryside and surrounded by farms. The South Platt River was off to the right and marked by a row of trees. These were the only trees in the area. Even though the fields were well irrigated, at least near the river, the locals seem to be morally opposed to planing trees. When there are trees, they are only around the houses and nowhere else. I contrast this with places like India where trees are planted along the roads to provide shade and shelter. Boy, could I have used shelter from the wind …

The road went to the NE and ran parallel with the railway line. The farms were growing corn and wheat but in the distance I could see dry hills so there is a fairly narrow band of irrigation. The rest is desert. The route I was following was along the old wagon trail, although they followed the other side of the river. One of the reasons that this was a popular route was because not only was there water but the road was also flat.

The first town I came to was Iliff which was named after one of the first cattle barons. This was typical of all the towns I was to pass through: dead or dying. The housing largely consists of old, run down houses or mobile homes. There are abandoned petrol stations, closed shops, and little or no commercial activity. This is a consequence of the replacement of horses by cars: the towns are all placed about 15-20 miles apart which is what you could ride in a day. However, with good roads and cars one can travel less than an hour to larger cities like Sterling so why shop locally? Unfortunately, this leads to the demise of the town, but that is the price of progress.

It was hard going with the headwind and I had trouble managing 20 km/h. Normally I would be going about 30 km/h on flat roads like these. By the time I got to Crook (what a great name!) I was 75 km along the way and was getting tired so I stopped for a rest in a very nice park. It was then on towards Julesburg which marked the border with Nebraska.

I continued on to Ovid which at one stage was a huge producer of sugar beets. During the World War II a lot if German prisoners were sent to the area where they worked on the farms. However, the local factory was shut down in 1985 after it’s owners, the Hunt brothers, lost their fortune in the silver market. Today it is an abandoned shell with lots of broken windows and not much else. This of course had a terrible impact on the local community as it was the dominant employer. With its closure the economy was devastated and most shops closed down. I phoned Lis and some teenagers came by and said ‘welcome to hell’. Obviously they were not impressed with their home.

From there it was to Julesberg, near the Nebraska border. Julesburg was named after Jules Beni, a Metis (French Canadian/Indian) who was the first manager of the local Pony Express station. He developed a feud with the local manager, Jack Slade, and so shot Slade with a shotgun. Unfortunately for Beni, Slade recovered and returned to kill Beni. He followed this up by cutting off Beni’s ears. One was nailed to a fence post as a warning to those who would hamper the express company’s operations. The other? He made a watch fob out of it and used to put it on the local bar when someone got aggressive with him.

The first Julesburg was destroyed by the Indians in 1865. A year later a second one was built, mainly as a stage station but it was abandoned after 2 years. A third one was built where the railway ended and was known as the meanest place in the West, with over 5000 inhabitants and dozens of brothels, casinos and bars. The final, and present one, was built in 1881 at the junction of the Union Pacific Denver Junction. This shows the transitory nature of development in the west where many places were started and once they outlived their usefulness were abandoned.

Another example of this is Fort Sedgwick which was the local army base. It was made famous in the film ‘Dances with Wolves’. It was established in 1964 to protect the Transcontinental Telegraph and travellers on the Overland Route from hostile Indians. It was described as a hard place to live "…the quarters, if any, were considered unliveable, the food was terrible, pleasures were few and the nearest bath was the South Platte River". I was used from 1864-71 after which, with the demise of the Indians, it was abandoned and the area reclaimed by the prairie.

I visited the museum in Julesberg which was housed in the old railway station. It was fill of all sorts of interesting material ranging from the Pony Express through items used for living on the frontier. I think that its great the way that the locals appreciate their history and are continually donating to the local museums. It is just a pity that more people don’t visit them – the guest books are seldom full. The elderly woman who was the curator was very chatty and she explained a lot about the history of the area. I mentioned that I had seen lots of old farming machinery, for example the abandoned dairy factory in Ovid had rows of machinery parked in front of it. She pointed to a huge she across the railway tracks which she said that it was full of machinery.

My next visit was across the road to the Fort Sedgwick museum which was a disappointment, although the young curator was very friendly and we had a long chat about things before I headed out onto the road again. I had hoped that during the course of my visit the winds would have abated, but this was not to be – if anything it was stronger! I had done 100 km but still had some way to go to meet my daily target.

I crossed into Nevada and the road narrowed with no shoulder. It was not a problem insofar as there was virtually no traffic! The going was tough and I was down to about 10-12 km/h. I had a rest stop under the motorway bridge and continued on towards Big Springs. The land was more hilly, but that is not saying very much, and there were still farms on either side of the road. I had a chuckle at the sign for Nebraska which called it originator of ‘Arbor Day’, for there were no trees. As I approached Big Springs there was a huge combine harvester which had been harvesting grain. I felt tiny next to it and it was unfortunate that I hadn’t seen it in action. I’m sure I will eventually get the chance.

There was nothing open in Big Springs so I sat on the steps of a local church and had some fruit and a rest. I had a further 35 km to Ogallela and about 2.5 hours of daylight. Under normal circumstances it would not be a problem but the wind was strong so these were not normal circumstances! However, I decided to go for it anyway. I was told that there was a bad hill outside of town, but I guess this is because when you live in the plains any hill is large. Were it not for the dead on head wind I would hardly have noticed it. Fortunately, after about 4 km it turned so the headwind was no longer head on.

The road was rolling and we were far enough away from the river for there not to be irrigation. The farms were therefore mainly grazing cattle, until we got closer to the river again where there were huge cornfields. The road eventually converge again with the railway in Brule which was yet another of these dying country towns. I was amazed at the level of traffic on the railway; whenever I was near it there were continuous trains, probably one every 10 minutes in one direction or the other. The record that I saw was 121 cars! Many of them were special double decker trains carrying two containers on top of each other; others had articulated truck trailers. Very interesting.

I reached Ogallala around 20:20. It was a very long day but I had made it. My map showed a camp site at a nearby lake but the sign said that was 20 km away directly into the wind so I decided to grab a motel. A fellow stopped his car to chat and suggested I try the Sunset Motel. Very basic but only $22 which was what I had paid at Estes Park to camp. I went to the petrol station next door and got a sandwich and burrito for dinner before crashing. Watched a history documentary on the Korean War, which started 50 years ago, before calling it a day.

On to the Next Day

  

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