National Ice Cream Day/Month, July 4th, Corn, and more racetracks

Sunday 7/15/2012

Hastings Campground

Hastings, NE

Today is National Ice Cream Day, and July is National Ice Cream Month!!!  So we celebrated by visiting our local Dairy Queen here in Hastings.  Surprisingly, the young lady who took our order did NOT know of today’s designated celebration!

Terri had the small Candy Shop Blizzard, which is the Blizzard of the Month, and I had the medium Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Blizzard.  They were delicious!

We watched the local Hastings fireworks show on the 4th of July from a spot located a few blocks away along with a bunch of others who had the same ideas of avoiding traffic and crowds.  The locals around here really like their fireworks.  The “show” before and after the official fireworks show was very impressive.  In fact, we were able to watch fireworks from our campground a few nights leading up to the 4th!  Driving home after watching the fireworks show seemed like driving through a war zone with all the fireworks going off around us.  Like I said, Nebraskans really like their fireworks.

I haven’t done a corn report lately, so here’s the pictorial report.  This picture was taken April 25.

We didn’t even know what was planted, if anything, at that time.  And now this picture, taken July 1, clearly shows how much the corn has grown.

This is one of the things we do here…

watch the corn grow!!!

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Fair warning again…

this is another racetrack report.  Skip it if you’d like.  I’m including this to help me remember when and what tracks I’ve visited as it seems I have no memory.

Thursday, 7/5, I went to U.S. 30 Speedway near Columbus, NE.

That’s a real racecar attached to the top of the sign.  The track is a 3/8 mile dirt track.

It was a good night of racing consisting of IMCA Sport Mods, Hobby Stocks, Sport Compacts, & Street Stocks and the SLMR Super Late Models.  Kyle Berck of Marquette, NE, won the SLMR Super Late Model feature for $1k to win.

Then Sunday night, 7/8, I went west to Dawson County Raceway located at the Dawson County Fairgrounds in Lexington, NE.

It’s a 3/8 mile dirt track located right next door to a Tyson chicken processing plant.  When I first arrived the odor was nauseating.  Luckily, the wind changed direction soon after I arrived.

Although a bit dusty, it was another good night of racing consisting of IMCA Modifieds, Sport Mods, Stock Cars, & Hobby Stocks and the SLMR Super Late Models.  Kyle Berck, again, won the SLMR Super Late Model feature for $1k to win.

Saturday, 7/14, I headed north about 17 miles to Mid-Nebraska Speedway near Doniphan, NE.  It’s a 3/8 mile dirt track formally named Mid-Continent Raceway.

The night consisted of Grand National Late Models, IMCA Modifieds, Hobby Stocks, & 4-cylinder cars, and NCRA Super Late Models.  Again, Kyle Berck won the NCRA Super Late Model feature for $2k to win.  The track was a bit too dusty and the bleachers were a bit too low, but the racing was good.

Tumbleweed… and another race night.

Sunday 7/1/2012

Hastings Campground

Hastings, NE

Last Saturday afternoon, the 23rd of June, our friends Jim and Dee (Tumbleweed) arrived here at Hastings Campground.  It was great news when they let us know they were stopping in for a visit here in Hastings.  We greeted them as soon as they pulled in to their site and then left them alone so they could get settled in.  After getting set up, they came over with a nice gift for us. 

It was a wonderfully delicious box of chocolates from Russell Stover.  They had stopped at the Russell Stover Candy factory (click on the link to read all about it) in Abilene, KS, a few days before arriving here.  That was a great unexpected treat!  Needless to say, there’s not much left.  Thanks Jim and Dee!  We sat and visited and watched the Nationwide race on TV.  Later Jim, Dee, and I (Terri opted out) went to the races at Junction Motor Speedway in McCool Junction, NE.

We all had a great time!

The races were run off very smoothly and were done around 9:30.  It was a good night of racing.

Sunday, the 24th, Terri and I headed over to the park for our morning walk.  Just before we left, the power went out.  It was back on by the time we got back from our walk.  Apparently the power outage affected other areas of town also.  Thankfully, it did come back on so we were able to run the A/C.  Later, we headed over to Jim and Dee’s for the afternoon where we watched the NASCAR Cup race and visited.  After the race ended we went to a local place called the Barrel Bar.

They were quite  busy for a Sunday evening.  The food was good, and the company was excellent.  The food here is grilled or char broiled, and they do NOT have a deep fryer, so no fries or onion rings!   Also, Jim noticed that all the employees working that night were women.  No wonder the food was so good.  After we finished eating, we headed back to Jim and Dee’s for a while and then headed home.

Monday, the 25th, we decided to go to a movie.  We visited for a while before heading downtown about 3PM where we walked around and stopped in at Eileen’s Cookies for a sweet snack.

Then we headed over to the movie theater to see Rock of Ages.

It’s a musical with lots of rock music from the 80’s.  It was actually better than I expected with good performances by Alec Baldwin, Tom Cruise, Julianne Hough, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Paul Giamatti, Brian Cranston, Russell Brand, and Mary J. Blige.  The four of us actually had a private showing as we were the only ones in the theater!  After the movie we went to a Mexican restaurant called El Toro.  The food was good, and we even received a Spanish lesson from the waiter while ordering our dinner.  Afterward, we went back to Jim and Dee’s and watched one of their favorite movies, “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” starring George Clooney.  We headed on home after watching that very entertaining movie.

Tuesday, the 26th, was our last day together.  We spent the afternoon over at Jim and Dee’s visiting and watching TV.  We spent most of our time at their place due to their cat allergies.  It was a great few days together.  We didn’t get out too much, but that’s okay.  We all really enjoyed just spending some time together.  Later in the afternoon we decided to go out to Bullseye’s Sports Bar and Grill.  Tuesday is barbeque day, and we all had a good meal.  Afterward, we headed back to Jim and Dee’s for a little while.  We didn’t stay too late though, because we knew that Wednesday was a travel day for them.

Wednesday, the 27th, was time to say “see ya later” to our friends.  They were heading out to North Platte, NE.  Here’s a picture of “Tumbleweed,”  Jim and Dee’s rig, in site 33.

Here’s their rig all ready to hit the road.

It was real nice spending some more time with them.  We’ll see them again this Fall in South Carolina, if not before.  Thanks Jim and Dee for stopping in for a few great days together.

  

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Fair warning again…

this is another racetrack report.  Skip it if you’d like.  I’m including this to help me remember when and what tracks I’ve visited as it seems I have no memory.

Friday, the 29th, I drove east to Greenwood, NE, to the I-80 Speedway just west of Omaha. 

It’s a 4/10 mile dirt track.

It was a good night of racing consisting of A-Mods, 360 Sprint Cars, and Super Late Models tri-sanctioned by the MARS/MLRA/CORN BELT CLASH series.  They started a bit later than scheduled but got the show done by about 11PM.  Terry Phillips of Springfield, MO, won the Super Late Model 35 lap feature for $3k to win.