Lied Lodge Was a Great Place To Stay

If you are ever in Nebraska City, Nebraska (south of Omaha, east of Lincoln), you should check out Lied Lodge.  We spent two nights there and it is a beautiful place.  It's run by the Arbor Day Foundation and so there was a great emphasis on trees and nature.  The lobby roof is held up by huge lodgepole pines from the northwest.  It reminded us a lot of the hotel lobbies in Glacier National Park where we were fifteen years ago.

It almost looks like a castle!

On the trails behind the lodge.  We didn't get to explore as far as we would have liked to as there was a wedding and reception going on in the barns at the end of the trail, but this was still a pretty walk.

From the back deck of the lodge.  We ate a couple of meals on this deck.

Mike on the trail.  Some of the trees were really unusual.  We also heard a lot of different birds but it was just too close to dusk and there wasn't a place to sit to wait for them.

If we ever go back to that area (which was a first for both of us) we will definitely go back to Lied Lodge!

Trip to Omaha

We have never seen so many red-winged blackbirds as on this trip.

We were hoping for a rose breasted grosbeak or a yellow headed blackbird, because according to the range maps they should have been around.  Or a summer- or scarlet tanager would have been nice also.  But it was not to be.

However, we did get a fleeting glimpse of a Baltimore Oriole off the deck of the Lied Lodge.

And on the way home, we got treated to a show by a scissor-tailed flycatcher, on a wire in front of a stoplight!