Pink Horses, Hailstorms, and Other Things That Drive Doctors to Drink
Prologue: Earlier this month I spent a few days canoeing on the Niobrara River in north-central Nebraska. (I’ve spent the last ten minutes staring at the word “canoeing,” wondering if I’ve spelled it correctly. There’s no way that’s right. No word should have three vowels in a row. It looks...unhealthy.) North-central Nebraska, which my friend Dr. Gonzo once referred to as “the ingrown toenail of America,” is a treacherous place full of murderous cows, sports bars that serve food guaranteed to raise your cholesterol levels, and dangerous locals who move in packs. But for all its pitfalls, there are certain elements of that wild place that make it worth visiting…
Niobrara River valley near Valentine
The guidebooks for Valentine, Nebraska (for unknown reasons, Dr. Gonzo calls it “Sin City”) trumpet the lush natural scenery, the nearby Niobrara, and a variety of local shops, restaurants, breweries, and...gas stations. It’s a lovely day when you can walk into a Casey’s at 7 a.m. and see two dozen people, all of them ugly, buying something called “breakfast pizza.” Oh, the West. That magical land of cowboys, rodeos, shootouts at the OK Corral, Clint Eastwood, and killer mosquitoes the size of your head. Welcome to Cherry County. We hope you enjoy your stay. Avoid the coyotes.
But I sound harsh. Valentine has its charms. Valentine’s Day was invented there. There’s a neat rustic downtown area. A few miles north of town the Niobrara—Dr. Gonzo once called it “the Missouri River’s teenage stepson”—cuts through the heartland like a murky scar. The water is generally muddy enough that if your hand is six inches below the surface, you can’t see it. The sharks are dangerous, but the whales are deadly. And if you actually wondered for a second if the Niobrara has sharks and whales in it, you also probably believed that Valentine’s Day was invented in Valentine. I’m kidding, folks. Valentine’s Day was invented by Brach’s candy company to sell more candy hearts.
I was part of a group of a dozen who spent five hours on the river, traveling downstream from Berry Bridge to Pembrook landing. Paddling my kayak six miles along the winding, scenic river offered plenty of spectacular views. Brown-red cliffs rose sharply away from the water, towering overhead. Trees lined the banks, some clinging to the cliffs like parasites to their hosts. The ancient path the river has eroded for itself from the land has allowed whole ecosystems to flourish. I was sitting serenely in my kayak, floating on the verge of epiphany. Then I looked back and almost shit my pants.
Storm clouds had come up like a vengeful dark blanket being drawn over the rim of the world. Wind currents suddenly rose, raking the surface of the river. The temperature dropped ten degrees. Black-winged hawks soared overhead, framed against the dying sky. “Holy babbling God!” I heard someone scream in the kayak next to mine. I looked over. Dr. Gonzo was staring at the storm, his face drawn. “What hath God wrought?” he asked. I had no answer. He spent the hailstorm huddled underneath a canoe, gobbling his emergency stash of pills and muttering darkly to himself, “why did I quit smoking?” The doctor, I believe, is happier indoors.
The weather reports that morning had, of course, promised clear skies until late afternoon (“Fucking nitwits,” Gonzo said, in reference to the meterologists). I thought about that sunny forecast as I sprinted 100 yards through pounding hail to get underneath the roof overhang of a cabin. We had gotten off the river 15 seconds before the storm struck. Huddled with fifty other people under the overhang, shivering and soaked, watching the most intense storm I’ve ever been outside in, I could only dream of a dry, clean, warm Casey’s. If you’re ever unsure where to go during a storm, head there. Dr. Gonzo told me he once waited out a tornado in a cinderblock Casey’s bathroom, calmly eating breakfast pizza.
An hour later the storm had passed and we were back on the river. The sun finally broke through the clouds half an hour before we reached Pembrook. Because the rain had washed away all the sunscreen I’d put on, I got a deep red sunburn.
Sunburned in a hailstorm. Right. Somehow it seemed appropriate. Nothing else makes sense in this dazed and confused year of 2020. “Droll thing life is,” Joseph Conrad (one of Dr. Gonzo’s favorite writers) once said—“that mysterious arrangement of merciless logic for a futile purpose.”
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For all the mishaps and mayhem described above, I enjoyed my trip west. It was spent in good company, with a certain peace that comes only from escaping the city for a few days. The storm is now a unique memory. Most hours in Cherry County were spent gazing at the postcard-worthy views of the Niobrara Valley, discussing life with my friend Jackson. I propose that those are the kind of memories that matter. (Is that something a cliche travel blogger would say? Is this becoming a travel blog? God, I fucking hope not. Okay, after this week, no more travel blogs.)
The Author and J. T. Bartak beneath a waterfall near Berry Bridge
My official final stats from the 10th Annual Great Niobrara River Expedition:
10,000 calories eaten (per day)
0 kayaks flipped (new record)
3 Bud Light Limes consumed (16 ounces each)
745 mosquito bites (estimated)
1 terrible sunburn (on my feet. Yes, really. According to Gonzo, my burnt feet looked like “two prairie dogs dipped in Sriracha.”)
2 waterfalls observed (where does the water come from? No one knows)
1 hailstorm survived (Lewis and Clark would have died)
In other words, real manly shit. There’s a strange and instinctual pleasure that comes from forging through a river and battling the elements. That, I found, was the real lesson taught in Cherry County: the weight of the American landscape. Driving through the countryside of northern Nebraska, the long unbroken views of the land seeped into my brain. A solitary windmill in a vast field. A cemetery ten miles from the nearest town. Hay bales stretched to the horizon, lined in neat rows. Twin telephone pole chains, reaching to infinity on either side of the smooth flat endless road. An abandoned railroad bridge above a dry creek. The unparalleled grandeur of the American sky. And a bright pink horse sculpture, right along the side of the highway, marking the entrance to a ranch.
So if you find yourself lost amid the blitz and the noise, the chaos and the fear, of this strange year we’re in, may I humbly suggest going outside. Look at a river. Go for a hike or something. Put down your phone, get off social media, and remember that there are things in nature that were here long before we were, and will remain long after we’re gone.
And if this makes me sound like a “fucking treehugger” or a “goddamn hippie” (Dr. Gonzo’s terms), to that I say: that pink horse haunts my dreams, and trees can’t get coronavirus.
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Epilogue: When we returned to the city, the wide streets and clean buildings of civilization looked like futuristic alien structures dropped from above. Sipping Bud Light Limes and discussing our journey, Gonzo and I agreed we shouldn’t have been surprised by the storm. As he noted: “This is 2020. Did you really expect things to go perfectly?” The doctor had a point. Practically the only perfect thing this year was, and remains, a fresh slice of breakfast pizza.
Many thanks to the Bartak family for inviting me on their annual canoe trip.
The sky over Cherry County at 6 a.m., July 11, 2020
