October 23, 2010. Garden City, Kansas. Sand Hill Cranes.

Two years ago we saw the sand hill cranes arrive in Texas, ready to spend their winter in the valley. It was a magnificent scene, seeing many hundreds of these hugh birds feeding on the fields. Yesterday we saw the birds eating on a field in Nebraska, getting ready to continue their flight. It was another great sight.

Highway 83 is a pretty drive with many curves and hills. Today we drove through the Sand Hills in Nebraska which are lovely. The only vehicles we see are the farm machines and the trucks carrying cattle. We have never seen such large cattle trucks and on this trip we must have seen five hundred. The other sight was the food lots. Hundreds and hundreds of cattle are kept in the enclosures fattening them up for sale. We first spotted them around Amarillo last year, and now we have seen them again in southern Nebraska and Kansas. It is quite a sight to see all that cattle in one small place.

We are driving south, parallel to 281, but further west by about seventy five miles. Not so far in miles, but a big difference in topography. We are still driving through the bread basket of the country, but with quite a different look. It was a lovely drive today, again a long day, leaving at 7:30 and stopping at Garden City at 4:30. A good day's work.