What the heck is the Ogallala Aquifer and why do I care?

Branson to Lincoln to Laramie

We are traveling from the land of bibles and the KKK to the spectacular Rocky Mountains. From 95°F and 90% humidity to 70°F and 10% humidity. From overcast to beautiful fair weather Q (fair weather cumulus or it’s-going-to-be-a-wonderful-day clouds!). In one day!

Our first day out of Branson was to Lincoln, NE, a nice, unassuming midwestern town. We headed down to the Haymarket area of town, sort of equivalent to Denver’s Larimer Square, just smaller and hokier. But it had a brewpub—actually it had many brewpubs to choose from and we chose Brewsky’s, not the most inspired moniker, but great beer nonetheless. My beer was a Breckenridge Brewery 471 Double-hopped IPA. Mmmmm, mmmmm, good!

One thing we noticed in Lincoln: tax! The tax on our hotel room was awesomely outrageous: Room, $139; hotel tax, $5.56; room occupancy tax, $7.23; room sales tax, $10.12; a total of 16.5%. Almost makes me think that Wyoming’s tax of “only” 10% is reasonable. It’s so easy to tax people who don’t vote in your elections!

The Ogallala aquifer underlies much of the land over which we were driving. It is a large, shallow aquifer underlying about 80 percent of the High Plains. About 27 percent of the irrigated land in the United States lies on top of this and yields about 30 percent of all ground water used for irrigation in the US. It supplies drinking water to 82 percent of the 2.3 million people who live in the High Plains area. And may run out in as little as 25 years. Maybe. Living in a desert, I really want to know as much as I can about water.

From Lincoln to Laramie is not only a change in climate and topography but in attitude. Laramie is definitely cowboy country. You can see it in the dress, the architecture, and the animals that are alongside the road. No longer are there just cows but now we see lots and lots of horses and even the occasional pronghorn.

It wasn’t a very long day, only 7am to 1:30 pm (stomach-standard time was 7am to 2:30pm) so we were able to go to Centennial, WY (not the same Centennial as James Michener wrote about). Such spectacular scenery. Especially since we have been flatlanders since June 17^th!

I have to show you some photos I took of flowers in the mountain around Centennial

Randy and a rest stop on the way to Centennial

Some of these tiny (each blossom is only about 1/2in across) flowers grow so slowly that they are hundreds of years old by the time they get this big.

I think this is an Alpine Forge- me-not

Mirror Lake

Randy at Mirror Lake

Pam at Mirror Lake

A bug and a flower. I can't resist!

 I love flowers, even if I don't always know what they are! These were spectacular, albeit tiny, tiny blossoms. 100 years to grow just a few inches! Life at a high elevation. Over 10,000 feet in the case of these flowers!

More of Mirror Lake

We tried to go further, but even with a Jeep, we couldn't.

I truly enjoyed the scenery from Branson to Lincoln. The transformation from rolling hills to flat, breadbasket scenery was entrancing. But going from the flat, breadbasket scenery to the mountains where there is still snow was so much more interesting. I think I am a mountain gal at heart. I loved seeing miles and miles of corn (“knee high by the 4^th of July”) but even more I enjoyed driving to Centennial from Laramie (look up Centennial  on maps.google.com) and seeing the wild horses feeding on the miles and miles and miles of native grasses. And the pronghorns. And the mountains with the overhanging cornices of snow (even on June 26, 2013). Plus the roads that are still (on June 26, 2013) blocked by snow. And the temperatures that range from 74°F to 67°F. Ah, bliss!

Had a beer at the Beartree Tavern and met a woman from Encampment, a REALLY small town well past Centennial; my son-in-law’s grandfather was born there. What beautiful country! If it didn’t snow so much and have so many Republicans, I might enjoy living there!