Keystone Trail, Omaha, Nebraska

Friday, September 14, 2012

20 miles

Left Sioux Falls this morning a little before 8 am. Drove south to Sioux City, Iowa and continued south in Iowa on Interstate 29 until we were east of Omaha, Nebraska. We then crossed the Missouri River and arrived at the trailhead for our ride. 

While we were in Iowa I got some information at the visitor's center about barn quilts. We were going to be driving through a county that had some of them and we thought it would be fun to go see some of these quilts that were painted on old barns. We spent almost 2 hours trying to find them. Unfortunately, we never found them but we did get to see some of the area called Loess Hills. We also went through the town of Onawa whose claim to fame is that it has the widest main street in the USA.

We started our ride in Democracy Park. This trail followed a creek through Omaha. There were some very nice things about this trail. It went north to south so we didn't have to worry about taking a wrong turn. We went 10 miles south and then turned around and came back 10 miles north. We didn't have to worry about traffic at all. The trail had underpasses under all the roads. About half of the underpasses had graffiti artwork so we  got some culture today while riding.

When we got to the trail parking lot and were unloading the bike an older woman was walking in the park. She came up to us and said "I love that shirt, God bless America". Clay was wearing a red, white and blue biking jersey that has stars and stripes on it. She said she was going to a pre- nuptial reception tonight and she would like to wear a shirt like Clay's to it. Too bad he didn't have an extra one to give to her!

Some of the things I didn't like about today's trail. It wasn't very scenic and the creek smelled. Every time we went under a road we got closer to the creek and got a good whiff of it. We also passed a shooting range and there was lots of gun fire and they were facing us. It was eerie and I was just praying we were out of their firing range.

Today's weather: Fabulous! Sunny and 75F