The Hastings Museum

We picked up some flyers for other museums while visiting Red Cloud and my Son decided he wanted to go to The Hastings Museum in Hastings Nebraska. I had intended on going to the Pioneer Village in Minden but he didn't really consider those to be museums. I aso like to visit the natural history museums so it sounded pretty interesting.

We found it, only about 45 minutes north of Red Cloud.

It has an imax theater but my fifteen year old can't watch those films, it makes him sick. We know we've had him get sick or almost sick all three times we've taken him to view a film at these theaters. Not a good idea.

We walk into the museum and see the stuffed animals and my son proclaims that "This is a museum." So, apparently the only museums that count are natural history museums.

I have a badger story to tell from our Nebraska journey. It was not these badgers who were sacrificed to be on permanent display for science decades ago, this is a real live badger story. We were going to take tubes from Naponee Nebraska to Bloomfield Nebraska and float down the river, well this began as a fun afternoon but soon we discovered that we were walking and pulling our tubes down a partially dried up river. With a 10,12,15,20,36, and two over 40 and Buddy the dog we discovered that a few miles down the river was a very long afternoon. So, it was decided that I would leave the river and run back to where the vehicles were parked and return to rescue the family. Of course, I'm in an unknown place with no cell phone and wasn't sure how many miles we'd went down the river. I left the river and headed across a huge field to find the road, but as I finally made it to the road I saw a critter meandering across the road. Very slowly, it was broad daylight and I knew it wasn't a skunk or a raccoon by how it walked. It was in no hurry. I then deduced that it was a badger. Badgers are not known for their docile personalities. So, I returned to the field and began walking and saw him peeking up at me from the side of the road. No, I really don't want further encounters with badgers. I did make it back to the car in about a half an hour and returned to rescue the poor tired crew. So, that was off topic, but I will always associate badgers with Nebraska.