Monday, 6 June 2022

Day 0 - Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun…

To Subway!

The breakfast offerings are limited but all come with cheese which is mandatory. Not sure if this is state law or a federal statute, probably the latter. So it’s two bacon, egg…and cheese subs, and at Alex’s insistence the foot long option of which I managed 10 inches (that’s 254mm in metric), which is unsurprising as it contained 4 (four) eggs. The eggs come precooked straight out of a box…

Back to the hotel to digest breakfast and it’s already quite warm. The socks and pants get chucked in the sink…with hair conditioner. Oops. Start again with finest hotel shampoo which does the trick, the luggage stand doubling up as a drying stand.

The initial SPC play tomorrow looked like eastern Colorado/western Kansas but was later updated from a slight to enhanced risk with a 5% tornado probability from central Nebraska to northern Kansas so I think we’ll be headed towards somewhere like Grand Island, Nebraska. A quick look at Google Maps and that is 498 miles, not dissimilar to day 1 in 2014. Remember a 5% risk means a 5% chance of seeing a tornado within 25 miles of any point in the designated area. This chance increases as you’re mobile and not in a fixed place.

I’m not especially hungry but Alex wants to try a Whataburger so I tag along for the 15 minute walk to just over the Oklahoma River. It’s over 30c now and feels it. Many of the food places along the route are closed down including the Sonic Burger drive through. Blimey, things are really not great, the hotel today is as dead as a dodo and it’s a sad place compared to 2019. Covid is the likely culprit but who knows.

Thankfully the walk in the heat was worth it as the burgers were excellent, by far in a way my favourite chain on the Plains.  We see no other pedestrians and arrive back at the hotel dripping with sweat. Nice.



A message from Peter arrives with the play unsurprisingly in southern Nebraska. It will be an early start so we’ll grab some “dinner” in the hotel and have the tour briefing at 20:00 instead of in the morning. Hopefully we’ll have time for a decent breakfast somewhere. Please! 










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