USNA 1973 Ride-2-Remember

Day 28, 31 August: Crawford to Chadron, NE

We bunked last night in one of the well preserved original Officer’s Quarters at Fort Robinson. It had a number of rooms as well as a fully stocked kitchen. Dave & Tom took the opportunity to cook up a spaghetti and meatball dinner. Doug served up ice cream for desert and Doug, Bill and Ron cleaned up afterwards.

It was interesting waking early this morning to the sounds of coyotes at Fort Robinson. The coyotes let you know that you are still “out west.” Couple that with the blue moon which brightly showed itself, it was a great morning.

Early this morning before we had breakfast, Mike Obert (24^th Company) showed up at our quarters. He had driven up from Houston, Texas to support our ride through Nebraska. He eagerly joined our support team. It was inspiring to see him out on the road to Chadron cheering us on.

When we got to Chadron we met Mike and Sally at the Bean Broker Coffee Shop where we had a great cup of coffee and breakfast. At the coffee shop, we ran into Mark Dykes, a reporter for the local newspaper, The Chadron Record. Mark wanted to interview us and write up our story. We discussed our mission in detail including how satisfying it was for us to pay tribute each day to our deceased classmates and that we hoped their widows could get some comfort in what we were doing.

Mark invited us to the Chadron Rotary luncheon. We gladly attended and met some wonderful people. We got a bit of local history from the guest speaker, Professor Matt Everston. We were also entertained by a local Rotary guitarist and singer.

Bill was a bit late to the luncheon, due to his first flat tire enroute. They wrangled his bike into Sally’s SAG and the flat club membership is now complete.

I was lucky to be the carrier of Stephen Sudkamp’s tag today. Suds was a good friend with whom I shared some great memories while we struggled getting through nuclear power school. Bill Montgomery carried Don White’s tag today.

Tom Tesoriero