2008 Western Adventure

Day 20 - July 9, 2008

After a good nights sleep in a real King size bed, I was welcomed with a great pancake, bacon, and fresh fruit breakfast.  As usual, I was the last one to finish eating, but I sure enjoyed it.  And the coffee was also outstanding.  I don't drink coffee much any more, but I couldn't resist the full bodied aroma of Barbara's special blended coffee. 

After breakfast we exchanged a few more stories about our past adventures, and then Jay asked me if I wanted to take a tour of their local train station that he has been so active in restoring and establishing museums within the station.  They had an old car museum, which was not real big, but included some very rare and beautiful cars, including the first Oldsmobile built. a wonderfully restored Pierce-Arrow, and one of the biggest Packard's that I had ever seen.  The museum attendant was as interesting as the cars.  He was a retired rocket scientist who had plenty of stories to tell about his days in industry.  He was also fairly knowledgeable of the the old cars in the museum.  He told a story about the first Oldsmobile, and how the came up with a price for the car.  There was nothing else to compare prices in 1901, so Ransom Oldsmobile decided to charge $1.00 per pound, or $640.00.

A lot of train car and engine restorations have taken place, and are displayed under a large canopy at the south side of the train station.  Of those restored, I was very interested in a WW II hospital car that would accommodate over 30 wounded service men.  One of the station attendants was so enthused to show us what the have been doing.  It's great that so many are willing to volunteer their time to keep our history alive.

Another amazing museum is the Browning Company gun collection.  The collection is extremely extensive, and include a scaled down version of many of their guns.  These little guns actually worked.

We also had a late snack at the cafe located in the train station.  We only had wings and onion rings, but they were delicious. 

Barbara had a very tasty chicken dish for us that evening.  She's a great cook

Jay and I talked away the evening, watch the Jay Leno monologue and then went to bed.