I woke with the sun on Monday morning, as campers tend to do. It was cold and extremely damp: water droplets clung to the inside of my tent, and when I shuffled slightly, I got a very chilly early-morning shower from the ceiling. “GAH I’M AWAKE!”

Stepping carefully out onto the grass, I found myself camped next to the Platte River—when did THAT get there? Thick fog rose off of it like smoke from a fire (err, sorry, Austin). As I packed the car, I heard animal sounds I couldn’t quite place, and then a perfect V of Canadian geese flew overhead. It was a glorious morning.

I followed the geese out of the park, driving through the first of many cornfields, and stopped for a Walmart resupply in Kearney, a surprisingly nice little town. Then I headed due west on Highway 30, again choosing the road less traveled (than I-80, in this case) in the hopes of seeing more neat little towns.

A mile-long, 150-car coal train rolled along the tracks to my left. Low, rolling hills were to my right. The train and I played tag for the next two hours; I’d leave it behind, stop to take a picture or visit a Pony Express cabin, it’d catch up, and we’d start over again.

The climate persisted in being annoyingly pleasant. I drove with my windows down. Houses had thick, luxurious grass in the yards, and not once did I see a lawn sprinkler.

Twice within a 20-mile stretch, I pulled over to read plaques commemorating an Indian raid that had happened on the spot—within a year of each other, actually. In the second the Indians succeeded in derailing an entire train and murdering the crew. Grudging respect, you killer Indians.

Finally around lunchtime, Señor Choo-Choo and I both arrived in North Platte, home of the Bailey Yard. Since you’re too lazy to click, I’ll just tell you: Bailey Yard is the world’s largest railroad switching station, like the best model train set you can imagine… only with ACTUAL TRAINS, so even better. It’s 8 miles long, 2 miles wide, handles 10,000 railroad cars per day, and is so important to American infrastructure that it’s on the Russians’ nuclear-bomb target list. Just check it on your iPhone, son!

I paid my fee to stand on the 8th-floor observation deck and watch the train cars come and go on the tracks for awhile. Then it was back up the road, through one sleepy downtown after another, with plenty of time to ponder life’s big questions: Why do they leave hay bales out for so long after the baling? Can’t they just… pick them up? …Why don’t they call them Maize Mazes? What if I meet a NICE bear?

Finally, though, my course turned northwest, along the North Platte River, and I started to see sites marking the first of my tourist goals for the trip: the Oregon Trail. It gets its own blogpost.

PS, if you haven’t figured it out, these posts are going to run about a day behind. I’ll try not to get farther off than that.

*Cousin to Cabinet Sanchez.