Nebraska State Capitol Building and Crane Migration

 

This morning Travalon and I explored the Nebraska State Capitol Building, which (as promised by our waiter last night) was much prettier inside. We didn't take the official tour, but we did spend some time chatting with the guy at the info desk, who could talk to Travalon about college football and me about how the legislature is the only unicameral one in the country, and nonpartisan to boot. Who knows? Maybe he could have even discussed better tuning systems than equal temperament. Anyway, here are some photos. First is a shot of the whole building:

This is the Catholic church across the way and a weird tower behind it.

This is another weird tower, on the Baptist church next to the Catholic one.

This is the unicameral chamber.

Here are more shots of the interior. I loved this chandelier that looks like the planet Saturn.

I guess the guy on top of the dome is a sower out sowing seeds. Makes sense for such an agricultural state.

The squirrels in the neighborhood were browner and friendlier than the ones back home.

We also drove by the campus of the University of Nebraska, but classes were in session, so there were no parking spots. Here is a photo of their carillon... I think?

And this is the Cornhuskers' football stadium.

Then we drove to Kearney and had seafood at a Mexican restaurant before heading to the Audubon Center at Rowe Sanctuary to see the sandhill crane migration on the Platte River. We followed our guides Steve and Steve out to a blind named Stevie, where we could hear cranes calling. When we first got there, there was a gathering of cranes, but we have seen as many in the little pond in Waunakee.

We also saw a killdeer.

More cranes started to arrive.

I love how they seem to parachute in, looking like rubber chickens in the sky.

There were some deer across the river from us.

More cranes arriving!

As the sun started to set, thousands flew in from every direction, making quite a racket. I love how they were gilded by the rays of the setting sun.

You could see them in every direction up and down the river. I felt like I was in one of those African animal migrations videos! Steve told me the BBC were there filming the cranes for an upcoming series on animal migrations.

A few of the cranes got quite close to our blind.

Even as the sun sank below the horizon, they were still arriving by the hundreds!

When they finally stopped arriving, we watched them for a few more minutes, and then Steve and Steve gave us red flashlights to help us follow the path back. Wow, was this an amazing thing to see in real life! It's quite spectacular to have hundreds of cranes flying right above you, bugling at each other.

Then Travalon and I went swimming. We actually did go swimming yesterday, which I forgot to mention, and that hotel's pool was as warm as the therapeutic pool at our health club, but we were only in it for a few minutes when it was invaded by a bunch of Future Farmers of America, so we decided to call it quits. Today there was a very cold pool and a hot tub that was actually tolerable, so I sat in it with Travalon until getting too hot and braving the pool. After a few minutes, the cool water actually felt good. We are at this hotel two nights, so we'll hopefully get to enjoy the pool tomorrow as well.

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