The Direct Route I hope....scroll down.

Try the link below, for a photo tour of the Sandhill country.

Here is a link that might be useful: sandhills of Nebraska photo tour

Looking at the pictures I imagine it takes a special kind of person to live there.

The whole area is awesome and unforgettable, especially if you are in the only car seen all day. (Several decades later, I remember the relief at finding a one-pump gas station cum general store near the end of the day.)

I know I wouldn't be comfortable living there; I want lots of trees and plenty of water in my immediate neighborhood, and this area is sorely lacking both. Grass-covered dunes without water are admirable, but not residential.

I remember traveling through Nebraska occasionally when my parents were driving back and forth to the West Coast. I loved the solitude, but it does take special kind of person to live it. I lived for awhile in Kansas, a state right under Nebraska, when my first husband was an engineer for a pipeline. It was just a short jaunt for us to go across the Oklahoma panhandle into Texas, so where we lived had more of a S.W. taste than Nebraska, and lacked those beautiful hills. Coming from an area with hilly terrain, and then being transplanted for many more years as a young adult in equally hilly terrains of the Ozarks, I felt desperately out of place in the sandy flatlands.

What strikes me most about the interior prairies of this country are the extremes. You are either freezing to death, burning up, wishing for rain, or dodging tornadoes. But, the creatures who live there, and the miles and miles of openness are haunting and beautiful.

The plains have a real beauty, but it does take a special kind of person to live with the vagaries of the weather and the terrain. One of my favorite things to do is to read first hand accounts about the early settlers who lived on the great plains (or the "Great American Desert" as they were called back then, which should tell you something). The good years of enough rainfall & bountiful crops seem to have been brief moments sandwiched in-between long stretches of drought & unbelievable hardship, yet the people who persevered grew to love the lonely landscape.

Thanks Suzy for those photos. Did you notice how the highway often seems to disappear in the distance? And the phrase "isolated farmhouse" definitely applies. Why in the world did someone name that river Dismal...Delighful River surely must have been more appropriate. I love privacy and solitude but don't believe I would like living in the areas shown...but then Gandie's descriptions of the weather had already convinced me I'm definitely not of his hardy stock. LOL josh

I chuckled too, when I read it Josh, but I think our state has that name beat, hands down. If you go to Pike County, Ohio, you can wade in Pee Pee Creek, in Pee Pee Township. I am not kidding.

LOl Suzy.

I loved all the pictures. I love Nebraska. On one memorable trip to the West Coast I found a place [campground] and just put down roots for two weeks. I felt so at home out there. A great place for a hermit. Smiles.

What beautiful pictures. It thrills me to know that there is still so much wide open land somewhere in the USA. It would be lonely and hard to live there, but those rolling hills call to me.

My DH grew up in NE, and I have been there several times. I grew up in the PNW, with mountains and trees and running creeks and rivers everywhere. Can you tell we have a little conflict?

I feel so EXPOSED in those huge flatlands! Can't seem to find anywhere to hide..and the wind! In winter, or even autumn, there's nothing between there and the North Pole but a barbed wire fence, and it's down! BRRRR!

I would love to see the cranes, and might even manage to exist through the road trip to get there (two full days with DH doing most of the driving..you don't want to know) and the mandatory visits with the relatives in order to do so.

I think I'd rather look at someone else's pictures. And he grew up there, and has seen this many times if he even looked, so is not interested. Thank you, Universe!