NEBRASKA NEWS

08/30/98

Post Register – Idaho News

Category: News Living

Published: 08/30/98

Page: E1

Keywords: Travel

Byline: Clay Carpenter  

Hope you got a good night's rest, because you've got 431 miles of Route 20 ahead of you in Nebraska. The good news is, it'll be interesting. National Geographic named Nebraska's stretch of Highway 20 one of the 50 most scenic drives in the country.  The sparsely populated highway slashes across the top of the state, crossing western piney ridges, plains and the state's famous cornfields and the Nebraska Sandhills. You pass by the Museum of the Fur Trade near Chadron, a honey festival in Randolph, and through Cody (known as "a town too tough to die") and Inman (self-proclaimed "home of friendly people"). In the Sandhills, you travel through cattle country and Mari Sandoz Country, home of historian and novelist Mari Sandoz.

HIGHWAY HIGHLIGHT: In Valentine, Neb., known as "the Heart City," the post office is inundated every February with Valentine cards, which are stamped with a special cachet and mailed to the recipients. Postal workers work overtime to handle the estimated 20,000 extra pieces of mail.

QUOTE: Valentine Postmaster Rick Bordeaux, on whether he sends out his own Valentines: "Yes. I'm not saying who to, though."