Omaha: steaks, fake beach, and rest

So, I must say that I grossly underestimated the city of Omaha, Nebraska. I have to admit I envisioned the entire state of Nebraska as a sparsely-populated prairieland, and I will say that the past two days have convinced me that I was thoroughly wrong and that I absolutely love the city of Omaha!!

Leaving Atlantic in the morning was both rough and exciting: our legs were ridiculously stiff from the previous day, but we were excited to be getting to a new state AND coming up on a rest day. We got an early start because we were expecting more of the same lovely headwinds to be joining us on our ride.

Join us they did, and the day was slightly less windy than the previous, but still very bad. In addition, we encountered a lovely 8 miles of gravel. Apparently Iowa, like Pennsylvania, does not pave its roads unless they are major highways. Greeeeat.

We pressed on through the gravel, holding on tight and remarkably only getting three flats as a team throughout it. But we made really slow progress given that riding on gravel is much tougher than pavement. We also learned that the only thing worse than riding on gravel is riding on gravel on rolling hills, and the only thing worse than riding on gravel on rolling hills is riding on gravel on rolling hills with 20-30 mph headwinds.

It was an interesting time. 

One group missed a turn and rather than turning around to get back on course decided to stay on Rt 6 for the entire day. They missed the gravel, but Rt 6 is a busy highway and I was glad not to be on it. While the rest of the groups detoured around a "Dead End" sign on one of our intended roads, another group decided to go Lewis and Clark style, ignore the sign, and ford their way through. Thus ensued an adventure that apparently involved walking across a soybean field, walking through waist-high grass (yes they checked for ticks), climbing over a barbed-wire fence, and my personal favorite, crossing a river on a downed tree -- all of this WITH their bikes! I saw videos of how this was done and I must say it was pretty impressive. It looked fun but I also was glad I wasn't in this group ;)

The day was another long and tough one with more of the same headwinds and hills. Luckily, the roads were less busy because it was a Saturday.

Even though we hated biking in it, I must admit Iowa was beautiful.

I can see for miles and miles....

During the ride, my group took two extra breaks... one to pet a super friendly dog:

Just look at that smile!!

And one at a pig farm we passed, to ask if we could pet their pigs. 

Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to pet the pigs, because they are organic hogs! The farmers are following all of the organic rules which include very strict restrictions on who and what is allowed to touch the hogs. The very nice lady we talked to said they must shower and put on clean clothes before handling the pigs, the truck must be professionally cleaned before transporting them, and that the hogs can catch disease simply from a spore coming off of a passing car. Given how filthy and smelly the pigs were, it was surprising to hear that. She also said that there's barely any difference between the taste of organic meat and non-organic meat, and that it doesn't make a difference to them what they do-- they just do the organic farming for the extra money. Makes sense! Business is business.

We were bummed that we couldn't pet the pigs, but the very nice lady gave us a donation for our cause, and what she said next made our day awesome: They sell their meat to Chipotle!!! 

You're looking at your future Chipotle burrito.

Ironically enough, we then had Chipotle for lunch. We were Team Carnitas for the rest of the day (carnitas is what Chipotle calls their pork).

 Finally, we approached the state line. Well actually, first we came across this cool bridge which we initially thought was the state line but actually wasn't.

It's just a cool artsy bridge over a railroad track in Council Bluffs, IA.

Four miles later we reached the actual state line. We took a nice pedestrian bridge over the Missouri River, and the state line was right in the middle of the river.

The pedestrian bridge. Apparently this is a multi-million dollar, fairly new bridge, and it's beautiful!

After crossing the state line, we only had about 6 miles to go, but they felt like forever! We climbed some REALLY steep hills getting into Omaha. Omaha is a super hilly city!!!!! Who knew?!?!

When we got in, it was close to 5 pm, and we were in for a treat: our first homestays of the trip!! Homestays are when individual families take in a few riders each, which means we get comfortable accommodations, good food, and a family to be a part of! The team was actually nervous about being apart because we have really become a close-knit family.

Gina, Meredith, Jen and I were assigned to a host named Jeff. 

Gina, Jen, Jeff, Meredith and me

Jeff is a middle aged guy with three kids and a wife, though we never got to meet his wife because she's a nurse and was working some crazy hours! We did get to meet his three kids, Grace, Joe, and Jack, who were all super nice and fun. Jeff is a cyclist himself and in his younger days he biked from Vancouver, Canada all the way down the Pacific Coast to LA. Jeff was really easygoing, nice, and just wanted us to have a good time. He was an awesome host. We also were spoiled immediately upon our arrival with a giant platter of fresh fruit and cheese, which we devoured. We were also in for this surprise....

A KITTEN!!!
I don't even like cats, but this guy was just so cute, and he provided us endless entertainment.

Grace was nice enough to give up her room and spend the weekend at a friend's house, so we had her room, an air mattress and a couch. We also were lucky enough to discover she had a ... drum roll please... CHI hair straightener we could use!!! Jackpot. (FYI CHI is the best brand of hair straightener there is). We straightened our hair and got ready for the fancy dinner we were being treated to!

Then, the whole team and all the host families met up for dinner at Cascio's Italian Steakhouse for some authentic Omaha steaks. There were at least 60 of us total and we had almost half the restaurant to ourselves. Before we ordered, each rider stood up and said a few words about where they are from and why they're riding. Then it was time for a delicious dinner and the opportunity to socialize with our amazing hosts.

The owner of the restaurant, Mr. Cascio, saying a few words about the restaurant's history.

Mr. Cascio talked about the restaurant's history and a little bit about steak in Omaha in general. I was shocked to learn that there was, and still is, a strong Italian presence in Omaha. I had thought that all the Italians called it a day when they arrived in New York. But apparently, some did go to Nebraska and in the '30s and '40s the 10 blocks surrounding the restaurant used to be all Italian immigrants. There used to be many different Italian steakhouses. Now there aren't as many, but the area is still called Little Italy. Also, like me, Mr. Cascio's grandparents were from Sicily, and I got to talk to him a little about that!

The dinner consisted of breadsticks, salad, pasta, a baked potato, and of course, a 9 oz filet mignon. Everything was delicious. Now, I don't even normally like steak, so trust me when I say this steak was fantastic!!

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As we were driving to and from the dinner, I was shocked at how big, modern, and lively the city of Omaha was. There were young people out walking everywhere, tons of little bars and food places, and shopping galore. It was not at all what I expected Omaha to be but I was pleasantly surprised.

A horse-drawn carriage giving a ride down an Omaha street

After getting home we pretty much went straight to bed as we were exhausted.

In the morning, we attempted to sleep in, although I woke right up at 5:45 feeling ready for the day. Thank you early wake up times!!!! I was able to go back to sleep, thankfully, and we all woke up for real around 9:30. Meredith had already gone for a run...she's crazy! Jeff treated us to a great breakfast of eggs, bagels, fruit salad, and BACON!! We love bacon and it is a very, very rare treat on this ride.

The team was split up doing various activities on our rest day. All of the boys actually went to the Strategic Air Command museum for a behind-the-scenes tour that Nitkin managed to hook up via a family connection. Some girls went to the Old Market, some went shopping, and some chilled by their family's pool all day.

We went to a bike shop, then Party City and a thrift shop to look for some 4th of July decorations and attire. We are biking on the 4th of July and we plan to be absolutely decked out from head to toe in America gear. I mean, we're gonna be in the middle of biking across the country on the 4th of July... it doesn't get much more American than that. 

Needless to say, a lot of America gear was purchased. I will leave it at that for now and save it as a surprise for the 4th ;)

After the very successful shopping trip, we were super happy with shopping bags and Starbucks in hand. But our day was about to get even better!

When Jeff had asked us what we wanted to do on our rest day, we said, "umm, is there a body of water we could go to?" Jeff took us to his brother's house, about 30 minutes away on Lake Hanson. You might be wondering, hmm, Nebraska isn't exactly known for its bodies of water?!? No it's not, but this lake was pretty sweet. It is actually a manmade lake that was created when the army dug out tons and tons of sand from this area to use at their military base. Now the lake is about a mile long and for all intents and purposes is a real lake!

Jeff's brother's house was packed with people, as their entire family basically congregates at the lake every weekend. Everyone was super nice, really interested to hear what we were doing, and very supportive. Jeff's brother then took us for a boat ride!!! We were basically in heaven. We cruised around in the boat for quite a while as he was pulling his kids on a tube. Jen took a turn tubing, but the rest of us opted to stay in the boat, because the lake was cold!

Afterwards we laid out for the remainder of our time in an attempt to fix some of our horrible tan lines. We then went to a pool party hosted by one of the host families.

The pool party was a lot of fun and they fed us some great food. The team was happy to be together again. Even 24 hours of separation had been strange after being together all day every day for so long. Actually, we had been texting each other on GroupMe the whole time (sending pictures of what we were doing/ hosts' pets, etc). The two boys that lived at the host led an effort to throw everyone in the pool, one at a time, regardless of whether they were in bathing suits or not. I actually managed to be one of the last ones to be thrown in... but it did happen.

Some people put up more of a fight than others; this is the wrestling match that ensued when 5 boys attempted to get Tom (green shirt) in the pool (they did succeed)

After the pool party we all went our separate ways again for a second night with our host families. I am up reallyyy late writing this post... but it's okay because tomorrow I'm in the water van.

The week ahead: We're spending a week in Nebraska, two days of which are centuries, and we have a rest day on July 5th in Arapahoe, NE. We have heard amazing things about our Nebraska hosts, who have been doing this for 10+ years, and are so excited not only to meet them but also to ride on some flat ground!!! On the flip side, we expect to see some HOT temperatures as we get to the western part of the state, and as leg leaders Chelsea and I are going to enforce some very early wakeups later in the week so that we can beat the heat of the day.

Thanks for reading and stay tuned for more on Nebraska! :)