We've been in Nebraska (and South Dakota) for a couple weeks attending a wedding, showing off the baby, and generally seeing people, but now we're back in the Treasure State and trying to settle into a more permanent routine.
Our drive to the wedding in South Dakota took us through the Sand Hills oasis of Alliance, home of Carhenge. Given our society's continued ugly slide into the morass of post-modernism, one day Carhenge will likely be a more recognizable Nebraska landmark than its capitol building (which, as I've said before and will say again, is without peer amongst the capitols of the several states).I've always thought the Gremlin (car at top) was an unjustly maligned car. Then again, unlike my uncle, I never drove one.
There is other art at Carhenge, including this sea (sand?) monster with a lower jaw that looks suspiciously like a late Beetle decklid.
The impetus for our trip was Melissa's cousin Patricia's wedding in Lead ("Leed") South Dakota. This rrrrusty '74 we spotted there near our hotel looks as though it's happy to still be someone's dependable ride. That surfboard has to be a lark, as Lead is less than 150miles from the North American pole of inaccessibility.
On the trip up we'd noticed this VW graveyard/shop just North of the Niobrara River on US 385. On the way back we stopped to take a few pictures and ended up talking to the owner for a while.
The full name of the garage is blurred on this photo because I don't want the guy getting in trouble for using the logo of a certain car manufacturer that has, except when it's convenient for nostalgia's sake, completely severed its ties with its rich history.
The owner was really friendly, and, similar to other guys like him I've known, said some kind of bizarre (though completely understandable) things, like that he "hates working on cars". It's a testimony to his skill that he can maintain a business working on these steadily-getting-rarer cars just East of the Middle of Nowhere. His shop was awesome.
This photo was taken during our time in Lincoln: two nice avocado Westies bookending two Splitties. The black one, which is a single cab, is known to me from when we lived in Lincoln actually. In August of 2001 I was borrowing 02McDonald's 1960 VW single cab to move me and Melissa in to an apartment together. During a run, this black single cab pulled up next to me and asked me to pull over. It turned out he was interested in buying the doors. How often do things like that happen to non-ACVW drivers?The baby was a real gem on the trip, taking lengthy car and airplane rides with good nature and aplomb. We hope that she'll do as well in Ludwig.
