Onward to North Platte, Nebraska

Holiday RV Park North Platte, NE

I think I mentioned in previous post we were going to see the Golden Spike Tower to view the Union Pacific Railroad Bailey Yard. The massive yard cover 2,850 acres (total length 8 miles), handling 14,000 rail cars every 24 hours. Over 3,000 cars are sorted daily in the yard’s eastward & westward yards, nicknamed “hump” yards. Using a mound cresting 34 feet for eastbound trains and 20 feet for westbound trains, the hump allows 4 cars a minute to roll gently into any of 114 “bowl” tracks. Here they become part of trains headed for destinations in the East, West and Gulf States, as well as Canadian and Mexican borders. An average of 139 trains per day are largely comprised of raw and finished goods such as autos, coal, grain, corn, sugar, chemicals and steel among other things. To keep things moving, the train operations and repair shops at Bailey Yard are open 24/7. The fueling & service center processes more than 8,500 locomotives a month; and the car repair facility annually replaces 10,000 pairs of wheels. Bailey Yard employs over 2600 people making a long term career opportunity for thousands here.
The ride itself was relatively easy, although the roads in Nebraska are not as well maintained as Wyoming, so it was a bit more bumpy and not much to see, so I’ll leave you with the pics Mr.Charley took while we were there:
The Tower observation deck is 8 stories high, so these are the panorama view: 

Google the reason why the US Standard Railroad Gauge is 56 1/2 inches wide

And, did you know there is a Sydney, NE? And, did you know that is headquarters for Cabela’s? And, did you know Cabela’s has an RV Campground there? (Another little tidbit of Nebraska trivia)

Did you know there is a museum in York, Nebraska called “Lee’s Legendary Marbles & Collectibles”? The only museum in the region dedicated to our favorite pastime, playing with marbles. The museum houses THOUSANDS of marbles of EVERY IMAGINABLE kind.


That’s it for now. Have a good one everybody, we’re sure trying to.

RV Riding is going for miles and seeing nothing, then BAM! something cool pops up